


White Snow: Justice

by Vhetin1138



Series: White Snow: Year 1 [5]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Bounty Hunting, Mandalorians - Freeform, OCs galore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2018-09-16
Packaged: 2019-07-13 05:05:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 18
Words: 71,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16010882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vhetin1138/pseuds/Vhetin1138
Summary: The Imperial forces of Mon Calamari are on the verge of total collapse. For months, the ruthless terrorist Jolee Uruc has been brutally ravaging the planetside military forces, attacking with lethal precision and leaving no survivors.In an act of desperation, the aging governor of Mon Calamari has placed a bounty on her head, hoping that the galaxy's deadliest mercenaries will be enough to bring the terrorist leader down.And who better to answer the call than a Mandalorian?





	1. Terrorist Attack

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This story, and subsequent ones in the Year 1 series, has not been fully re-edited for errors and quality. They will be updated at a later date. Thanks for your patience.

_“Aaray ru’dinuir de vode kadala jatne.”_

_“Wounds inflicted by friends hurt the most.”_

_\- Mandalorian Proverb_

_~~~~~~~~_

The table was a beautiful thing: solid Wroshyr heartwood imported directly from Kashyyyk at no small cost. It was very hard to find on the Black Market and almost impossible to get anywhere else. The Wookiees jealously guarded the trees of their homeworld and slaughtered anyone who dared log the forests without their permission. This particular piece came courtesy of slavers who had seized a village of the hairy furbags and set them to work deforesting their own precious Wroshyrs under threat of torture or death. It was therefore a quite expensive commodity, a rare treasure even among the wealthiest of the galaxy’s scum.

Jolee Uruc knew that in Mon Cal's humid air the wood would probably rot in a matter of weeks. The polished surface was already beginning to pucker and warp from the pervasive humidity of the ocean world. She didn’t care; one had to learn to enjoy things while they lasted and not waste time mourning them once they were gone. The priceless table was nothing but a temporary extravagance that she nonetheless thought she rather deserved. After all, it wasn't every day she struck such a decisive blow against the Empire. She’d earned a bit of extravagance in her life.

She leaned back in her chair, resting her hands behind her head and putting her feet up on the table, scraping the mud from the soles of her boots on its edge. She then sighed contentedly and closed her eyes, a small smile tugging at her lips. She was well aware of her Warriors waiting for orders, staring at her with nervous expectation. She kept them waiting anyway.

Eventually one of them cleared his throat and murmured, "My lady? What is thy command?"

The speaker was a Drai'munna, a human species that had yet to move past Old Basic speaking despite their technological advances. Normally she would have shot the man for daring to interrupt her peace and quiet. But he was one of her oldest and most loyal Warriors and Drai’munna, after all, were a backwards people still bogged down by cultural expectations of honor and loyalty. She had paid quite the pretty penny for this man’s loyalty, and — unlike the Wroshyr wood table — that was not an investment she was willing to so quickly abandon. So instead of shooting him, she held up her prosthetic arm and waved a metallic finger in warning.

"Shh...” she whispered. “Just savor the moment. Victory is sweet, don’t you think?"

Her newest recruit leaned over to the tall Quarren female beside him and muttered, "She's a little cocky, eh? Better to savor the moment  _after_  we're done with the-"

This man was not as lucky, or as important, as his Drai’munna companion. Uruc drew her pistol and shot the man in the head. She didn't even open her eyes to aim — just drew and pulled the trigger. The blaster popped loudly in her hand and a flash of red light painted her assembled soldiers with bloody illumination. The Warrior was blasted off his feet, dead before he hit the ground a half-meter away.

She absently twirled the pistol around her index finger before holstering it again and shifting to a more comfortable position. Her Warriors did not speak again. It was a few minutes more before the tense silence of the room was broken by the pilot’s voice.

“ _We_ _’re approaching the drop zone_ ,” he reported over the ship’s intercom. “ _Touch-down in ten minutes. Repeat, ten minutes._ _”_

Only now did Uruc finally open her eyes. She reached down into her boot and pulled out a well-worn holoposter, folded and re-folded many times. She spread it across the table and tacked down the edges with throwing knives from her belt as her Warriors moved closer. The poster showed the three-floor schematics of a large building. A military command outpost, in fact.

“Last run-down of the plan,” she said. “Pay attention.”

Nods and grunts of affirmation met her words.

"Fallon," she said, gesturing to the Drai’munna. "You're in charge of security systems. Make sure no one is able to see in or out of the building. Tint the windows with the code I've given you and lock down the command center as soon as we take control. I want that place sealed tighter than a Hutt’s treasure vault."

"It shall be done."

She turned to the Quarren, tapping the diagram of the roof area with her mechanical hand. "Uisha, you're our eyes and ears. Find a good position on the roof and pick off anyone who comes too close. If they mobilize air support, use your rockets."

The Quarren female made a quiet squishing noise with her mouth-tendrils and blinked her large eyes slowly; her kind's version of a human nod.

"Tallnaka," Uruc said, turning to the single massive Wookiee lurking in the shadows on the other side of the table, "you're our big gun. Keep the hostages in line once we've secured the three floors."

The huge black-furred Wookiee unleashed a menacing snarl, to which Uruc replied, "I don't know, rip the arms of one of 'em and roar really loud. You're the big furry one, think up something yourself. You’ve never had trouble with it before."

Tallnaka let out a rumbling howl and clapped his huge furred hands together, flexing his overgrown and sharpened claws.

"All right," she said to the rest of her Warriors as she felt the ship begin its deceleration, "we get in, we get what we want, we kill a few people, and we get out without losing anyone of ours. We've got everything we need to finish this op, and there'll be a bonus for all of you if this is successful."

"Ma'am," a Twi'lek Warrior asked quietly, "we’ve been over this plan time and time again. We’ve been prepping for almost a month now, but you’ve never explained exactly what we’re looking for. Why are we here?"

Uruc moved to draw her pistol, then laughed as the Twi'lek almost dived under the table in fear. When Uisha dragged him back to his feet, she folded her arms across her chest and said, "That's not your concern. Not yet. Just do your job and let the rest of us do ours. Got it?"

"Y-yes ma'am."

“ _We_ _’ve reached the drop-zone_ ,” the pilot called. _“Good luck out there, Boss.”_

The exit portal sheathed open with a tortured scrape of metal and salty air blasted through the hold. The table would be covered in a coat of rot and mold when she returned, Uruc knew. She smiled a little and brushed her fingers across the warping wood as she stood and headed for the exit with the rest of her troops. Her Warriors were already disembarking, armed with knowledge of their mission and prepared to do their appointed duties. One by one, they dropped through the exit portal onto the ground below, blasters and body armor carefully concealed beneath long travelers’ robes.

With a rumble and a gusty downdraft that sent their coats flapping, the old dirty-yellow transport blasted away, quickly disappearing into the foggy distance. She watched it shrink into the distance until it was lost over Mon Calamari’s endless, pristine blue oceans. Then she turned her gaze to the building ahead of them and the treasures waiting for them inside.

The slate-gray, boxy building that was the Mon Cal Imperial Garrison Command stood out against the blue-green sky. Clouds overhead threatened to spill down rain. It was a good sign; if a storm was raging, the Imperials wouldn't be able to send in aerial support. Uruc could taste the airborne sea salt on her lips as she and the others strode through the main doors. The large room within was full with different beings running through Imperial business; acquiring starport visas, preparing to test for ship licenses, registering for housing in the refugee sectors across the city. Four stormtroopers stood guard near a pair of marble pillars that flanked the entrance, but they gave Uruc and her Warriors little more than a cursory glance as they passed. In fact, no one even looked up as they entered the room.

The Garrison was the nexus of the local Imperial presence. From here, officers and bureaucrats coordinated stormtrooper patrols, communicated with passing naval fleets, and sent reports of suspicious activity to Imperial Intelligence. It was the beating heart of the Empire in Saiton City, and Jolee Uruc couldn’t wait to drive a stake through it.

Her Warriors were careful to avert their faces from the security cams. It was no easy feat, but the majority of them kept to the shadows are lurked on the outskirts of the main atrium, where even the luckiest of security drones would only pick up partial images. Uruc didn't bother, of course, for her face was already posted on wanted signs across Mon Cal. When she appeared, she _wanted_ the Empire to know she was coming.

Her bootsteps seemed to echo across the room, even amid the hustle and clamor of Imperial life in the Garrison. Still, no one paid her any mind; there were too many people here to focus on a single unassuming woman and her traveling companions. A few stormtroopers gave her a cursory look-over and a black-plated protocol droid waddled stiffly forward to welcome her, but apart from that she was lost in the ebb and flow of Imperial business. She paused only when she had made it to the middle of the room. She craned her neck, looking around at the atrium and its inhabitants. Her eyes lingered on the scarlet drapes and flags bearing the segmented Imperial Wheel — the sigil of the Emperor and a symbol of Imperial power across the galaxy. She smirked at the sight.

Then she raised two fingers in the air and her scattered followers pulled out their monstrous-looking facemasks. Blasters were produced from beneath their long coats and shouts instantly rang through the atrium. Uruc drew her pistol and shot the nearest stormtroopers in the back, the loud  _pow_  of her blaster ringing through the room. They crumpled like heavy sacks of grassgrain, their armor clattering loudly against the tiled floor. The room was instantly filled with noise as patrons screamed and scrambled for cover, stormtroopers shouted orders, and Uruc’s Warriors shouted right back. Blaster fire lit up the atrium as the troopers realized the true nature of the threat, but by then it was too late. Her Warriors were spread out and entrenched in cover, and cut down the white-armored soldiers without difficulty.

Uruc caught a flutter of motion from the corner of her eye; one of the civilian patrons, a bearded human in a black armorleather coat, had drawn a vibroblade from his pocket and charged her, obviously trying to be a hero. Yet he hadn’t accounted for the black-furred creature lurking in the shadows behind him. An unfortunate mistake. Uruc gestured at the man and Tallnaka let out a roar that seemed to shake the ground beneath her feet. The massive Wookiee charged forward with great lumbering footsteps and grabbed the man by the shoulders. With a great bellow of rage he hauled the human into the air and threw him bodily through the air, into a large support column of hardened duracrete. There was a sickening _crack_ and the nearest patrons screamed even louder as dark blood spattered the spotless gray floor. Tallnaka howled again and flexed his now-bloody claws.

Chaos reigned. Men, women, children, and aliens ran in all directions, clamoring and crying. It was a futile gesture, as her Warriors had blocked off all the exits. The atrium belonged to her.

Uruc raised her blaster and fired at the ceiling, only needing one shot to bring all attention to her. The screams slowly died and the civilians — now hostages — were quickly subdued by her Warriors and their fearsome armaments. After a few long moments, all eyes were on her.

She smiled. "Good afternoon everyone," she said to her assembled prisoners. She lowered her weapon and cradled it in her hands like a precious child as she swaggered forward into the proverbial spotlight. "A pleasure to see you all on this blustery day. My name is Jolee Uruc, as I’m sure you are all aware. The men and women you see before you are my Warriors.”

Hushed whispers raced through the room at her words, quickly silenced by the masked troops and their guns. Uruc waited a few moments for the noise to calm down before continuing.

“You are now my hostages. Kindly stay on the floor, stay quiet, and don't try anything stupid. Rest assured my Warriors _are_ watching, they _are_ listening, and they will not hesitate to kill anyone who tries to start anything."

Her hostages whimpered or cried or covered their heads as her nightmarish Warriors passed by them. It gave Uruc a deep sense of satisfaction; the operation was going precisely as planned. Even as she watched, Fallon the Drai’munna moved off to the databanks to the rear of the atrium while Uisha made for her sniper perch on the roof. Tallnaka prowled through the terrified crowd, his beady eyes glinting as he let out a low, thundering snarl.

"Follow my orders," Uruc said, nonchalantly reloading her pistol, "and the luckiest among you may make it out alive. Disobey and every single person in this building will die. Understand?”

The hostages nodded in assent to Uruc’s simultaneous disappointment and glee. They didn’t understand anything. They couldn’t even begin to see the big picture, the wonderful plans that were taking shape all around them.

She lamented their ignorance. And she had no intention of letting any of them leave the Garrison alive.

~~~~~~~~

Imperial Governor Tallus Vonn heard hurried footsteps in the hall outside a half-second before the door to his office sheathed open. He glanced up to find his administrative aide, Commander Pelano, leaping into the room at just under a run. He flashed his security clearance at the stormtrooper guards called, "Sir! Sir, you're going to want to hear this. I have urgent reports from Saiton City, Governor."

Vonn frowned and set aside his stylus, motioning Pelano forward. "Come in, Commander. What is it?"

"It's..." Pelano hesitated, out of breath. "It's Uruc, sir. She's made another hit."

Vonn’s face paled as he felt that icy sense of dread settling into the pit of his stomach. It was becoming a familiar feeling by now, almost second-nature to him. He set down the flimsi he'd been reading and motioned to the trooper guard with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Leave us.”

The troopers snapped to attention and spun, marching from the room and closing the heavy durasteel blast door behind them. The barrier slammed shut with a resounding  _boom_ and Vonn heard a mechanical clattering as the many security locks clicked into place. He found himself grateful for such precautionary measures in these dangerous times.

The Governor stared at the door for a moment longer, then stood from his seat and turned to the large observation port window behind his desk. The huge blue-green orb of Mon Calamari hung centered in the transparisteel viewport: a beautiful canvas of dark aquas and pale sea greens, swathed in a blanket of gray cloud formations here and there. A large hurricane was forming near the equator, and both the North and South Poles of the planet were shrouded in dark clouds. Imperial ships flashed past the viewport as transports waited to ferry their cargo to or from the system. Star Destroyers prowled orbital space like predatory sharks, while smaller patrols of TIE fighters raced through space in all conceivable directions.

This was Imperial Order at its best; everyone doing their job, everyone minding their own business, everything working like a well-oiled machine. It was such a calm paradise from this distance, an idyllic dream that had once again been rudely interrupted by the harsh truths of reality.

He sighed and rubbed his eyes. "Where this time?"

"Planetside Imperial Garrison Command," Commander Pelano replied. "Saiton City. She took hostages, sir."

"By the Force…" The Governer half-turned. "Is everyone all right?"

"Reports indicate that fourteen stormtroopers are reported dead, as well as two of our onsite officers. Damage to the facility itself is estimated to be in the range of several hundred thousand credits with-"

"I'm talking about the civilian casualties," Vonn interrupted, a harsh note in his voice. " _Civilian_ casualties, Commander."

"Um...” Pelano grimaced. “Total, sir."

"What?"

"The civilian losses were... complete, sir," Pelano said. "Uruc’s thugs, they… planted a bomb within the building while they were there and detonated it when they left. No one survived."

“By the Emperor’s Hand…” More of that sickly feeling of apprehension, mixed now with a surge of grief and pity for the victims he as Governor was honor-bound to protect. Vonn buried his face in his hands. "What were those heartless bastards after?"

"We... don't know."

He looked up now, all trace of apprehension or grief swiftly replaced by indignation. "Care to run that by me again, Commander?"

Pelano tightened his lips and murmured, "We have no clue why they attacked. The first thing they did was cut the security cams and tint the windows. And the subsequent explosion rendered any other computer terminals inoperable. We believe they were after prison security codes and that they intend to free other insurrectionists captured during a raid two months ago."

“Another attack. And so soon after the last… Damn it, Pelano, how do they always know? How can they see where our weaknesses lie and so efficiently exploit them?"

"Sir?"

"Three-quarters of Garrison Command's security detail were away on training exercises today and someone kriffed up and forgot to repost any reserves! It was a single weak spot that would have lasted less than five hours! How did they know _precisely_ when to strike?"

"I... I don't know, sir," Pelano said. "I would have to assume-"

"There is only one way," Vonn interrupted. "One way they could know our day-to-day military procedures with such accuracy. They have a mole within our forces here."

He turned back to the viewport with a disgusted shake of his head. "Commander Pelano, you have new orders. I want you to call in Imperial Intelligence, report this latest attack, and track this mole down. See to it personally."

"But sir!" Pelano insisted. "My work with the local bureaucracy in Coral City-"

"I don't give a damn about your gruntwork with the bureaucrats, Commander. People are _dying._ It is time for you to leave your office and show the people of Mon Calamari that the Empire takes such matters seriously.”

He turned to the Commander. “Find this mole, arrest him, and execute him. Those are your orders and I expect you to obey. Or perhaps your duties would be best served by another Commander?”

Pelano’s face was stony. The only indication of his displeasure was the way the corner of his mouth twitched. He stood stiffly, then muttered, “As you command, Governor Vonn.”

“Good. Now leave me. I must attend to this newest crisis."

Pelano snapped to attention and saluted, though not without a final glare at the Governor’s back. After a moment he was gone and the stormtrooper guards returned to their post. Vonn settled back into his seat and rubbed at the bridge of his nose with a weary sigh.

Too many deaths. Too many attacks. It wouldn’t be long before Lord Vader himself heard of the situation and came to intervene personally. Unsurprisingly, that was the last thing Governor Vonn wanted to happen. This situation had to be dealt with  _now_.

He produced his personal comlink from within his uniform pocket and entered a calling code reserved for only the most dire situations. After four hailing tones there was a click from the other end and a female voice spoke.

"Office of Imperial Intelligence,” she said, almost sweetly. “Please state your business with us today."

Vonn took a deep breath. "This is Mon Calamari Governor Tallus Vonn, clearance code Bantha-Bravo-Thirteen-Thirty-Eight. I must speak to Director Armand Isard as quickly as possible."

"Of course, sir," the woman’s voice said. "May I inquire as to the nature of your business with the Director?"

"You may," Vonn said. "There is a terrorist wreaking havoc on my planet. I want her dead. And I want Imperial Intelligence to help me kill her.”


	2. Lover's Quarrel

**Vhetin's**   **bastion, Kelita**   **forest, Mandalore**   **(two**   **weeks**   **later)**

Cin Vhetin stared at the helmet resting on the small wooden table in front of him and wished for warmer weather. Though it was a relief to relax out of armor for a while, his body had long since grown used to the internal heating and cooling systems of  _beskar'gam,_ Out of it, he was all too aware that his bastion’s temp regulators weren’t in perfect working order. And underground, it was always cold.

His hands seemed to him like frozen blocks of ice and they trembled as he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, calming his mind and clearing it of all conscious thought. He felt his heartbeat start to slow, which he was sure would not help his chills. He relaxed against the couch and let his mind slowly begin to wander, to bring up what his subconscious felt was important. The quiet drone of the holovid playing in front of him helped him relax — it was some documentary about the history of the Incom Hypernautics Corporation and the narrator’s dry voice was talking about revolutionary S-foil designs. He easily tuned it out.

It had been a busy few days lately. Kassh was finally dead; he had received confirmation of his execution from his contacts within Black Sun. The crime lord's reduced bounty of seventy thousand credits had been split between himself and Jay, as well as their unexpected ally during the job, Kalyn Farnmir. What money was left over from his purchase of Jay's new Skyraptor fighter was safely deposited in his hidden credit account.

He lingered on the thought of his partner for a moment. She had performed outstandingly well while hunting down Kassh two weeks before. She'd saved his life more than once over the course of their mission, and he could honestly say he was surprised. He'd initially been concerned during her training that she would be more of a liability than a help in the field, but his concerns had been proved wrong a hundredfold. In fact, Jay was probably the best partner he'd had in a very long time.

She had definitely earned his gift to her: a sleek silver-black MandalMotors Skyraptor Interceptor which she'd christened  _Vengeance_. She was currently test-flying the ship in low orbit with Rame and Jaing, no doubt putting the ship through its paces before taking it out on a contract. Vhetin hoped she now knew that bounty hunting wasn't all bad; there were some quirks that came with the trade as well, like having all the best legal and illegal weapons, ships, armor, and other equipment that credits could buy.

He shifted his position on the couch and opened his eyes again. Yes, he thought that the last contract had gone better than he'd planned. It was an unexpected, yet welcome surprise for once.

"So," Brianna said, appearing from the kitchen with two glasses of  _tihaar,_ a popular Mandalorian wine, "Kassh bit the dist at the end, did he?"

Vhetin nodded and gratefully accepted the drink offered to him. "I'm finally able to relax now that I know he's gone for good. It’s nice knowing I’ll never have to chase after him again."

“It’s not every day you manage to gun down your mortal enemy.” She smiled and sat next to him. "You certainly hunted him long enough to earn the break."

"I’ll say," Vhetin agreed with a weary sigh. "I had to cut Durge in half  _twice_. That's two past my yearly quota."

Brianna laughed and passed her  _tihaar_  from hand to hand, careful not to spill any of the drink. "In any case, I'm glad you're back safe."

She leaned up against him, putting her head on his shoulder and squeezing his hand. Vhetin shifted slightly, uncomfortable, but didn't stop her.

"So how did your new partner perform?" she asked. She took a sip of her beverage, absently watching the Incom holovid. "Pretty well from what I heard."

"She defended the entire transport lot at Kassh's Tatooine base all on her own, and destroyed a Mark-Three Darktrooper droid with a dead Gamorrean's vibro-axe. If that's not talent..."

"And where were you at the time?" she asked, looking up at him and batting her eyes innocently. She already knew the answer, and had teased him about it ever since he told her his side of the story. But he sighed good-naturedly and humored her.

"Having my chest crushed under another Darktrooper's foot. But I made it out all right, so stop rubbing it in."

She touched his bandaged arm, a wound that had been torn, shot, stabbed, and re-torn more than three separate times during the mission. It was finally healing up, and it wasn't slowing him down like it had during the job, but such a wound would leave a mark, bacta or no. He should have seen to it sooner — a fact Brianna had wasted no time pointing out.

"You didn't make it out quite alright," she murmured, "with a wound like that and frostbite from Rhen Var. I'd give you a... six-point-five."

"You're very generous.”

"I'm in a good mood tonight." She set aside her drink and maneuvered herself to straddle his lap, pulling him close. She grinned and put her arms around his shoulders as she whispered, "It's good to have you back, in any case."

She leaned forward and kissed him gently on the lips, running her hands gently through his hair. She murmured with enjoyment as he wrapped his arms around her waist. He savored the taste of her lips, the feel of her body against his. She smiled against him. “I had an idea. That vid you like is on the HoloNet tonight. _Concordian Dawn?_ We could finish our bottle of _tihaar._ ”

“I, uh…” he hesitated. “I actually have a meeting about a contract tonight. Something about a rogue merc band on Belsavis.”

She drew back, her face falling. “Oh. Okay. Well I can record it. We can save it for tomorrow.”

He grimaced. “I have business at MandalMotors tomorrow evening.”

“Then—”

He pulled back with a gentle shake of his head.

"Bri..." he said quietly. “Can we not do this? At least not now?”

“What? A-are you sure?” she sounded more than a little hurt.

“I’m sure. It’s just… not a good time. Got other things on my mind.”

She sighed and visibly deflated. "Can't we just celebrate you being back? Just a little?"

"I wish we could. It’s just…”

“Difficult,” she finished for him with a frustrated sigh. She moved away and settled onto her side of the couch. She folded her arms and huffed.

“I’m sorry,” he said with a deep blush.

She scoffed with a wave of her hand and a mutter of, “Don’t bother. I know how this works. You get in your moods, I get defensive, and we wind up fighting. I don’t want to go down the usual track.”

“I don’t ask to be like this,” he returned, a hint of venom in his voice. “It’s not like I want to push you away.”

“Then why do you? Would it hurt so much to relax just a little? You don’t have to always be on contracts, you know."

He sighed and didn't answer, keeping his gaze fixed on the floor. Brianna stared at him for a while, expecting a response, then stood up and strode to the entryway, staring into the other room.

"Damn it, Cin..." she muttered, shaking her head. “Sometimes I think I’d have better luck dating a brick wall.”

He felt indignation and defensiveness rise in his gut. As soon as he felt it, however, he crushed it, buried it, and tossed it aside. Rather than a bitter retort, he resorted to a quiet murmur of, "I am what the galaxy has made me."

"That's a lie as you know it," she snapped. She turned to face him, leaning against the doorframe and cocking her head to an impudent angle. “I know Mandalorians are supposed to be these perfect killing machines, but you… you take it too far. You seem to think being miserable and being strong are one and the same.”

She scowled at him. “Do you like being this way? Do you enjoy keeping me at arm’s length?”

“I don’t…”

“Do I not make you happy? Is that it?”

“Of course you make me happy!”

“Then what? What do you _want_ from me?”

Vhetin didn’t answer, barely moving a muscle. He knew she had a point but would never allow himself to admit it. These simple expressions of affection that came so easily to others seemed to catch in his gut and claw on their way out. He cared for Brianna, of course, but was not so skilled at showing it.

She finally looked up at him with a dark look in her eyes. Her brows furrowed dangerously as she murmured, "What exactly am I to you?"

He didn't like where this conversation was headed. "What do you mean?"

"It's a simple enough question; what do I mean to you?" She took a step closer. “Am I a friend? A lover? Or just a nag who doesn’t know when to give up?”

"You are..." he struggled with the words. Part of himself screamed out to say the words she so clearly needed to hear, to finally break free of his own misgivings and tell her exactly how he felt. To reassure her that he loved her, that he would always love her, and that this awful hesitation holding him back was not evidence to the contrary.

But the stronger part of him suppressed those feelings, smothered them in a haze of fear and self-loathing. _Don_ _’t say it_ , his inner weakling whispered. _It won_ _’t come out right. She won’t understand. You don’t deserve her and she knows it._

That voice won out. So instead of telling the truth, he said what he had to say. What his mind told him to say, and what his heart begged him not to.

"You are the one,” he said, “who helped me through the hardest time in my entire life. The one who was there for me when no one else was. Because of that, I owe you a debt I can never hope to repay."

His words had exactly the effect on Bri that he'd thought. She scowled and gestured between the two of them with a scoff of disbelief.

"So all this -  _us_   _-_ is just you  _repaying_  me? There's nothing more between us than that?"

“That’s not what I—”

“Is this all just a bloody _transaction_ to you?”

“I’m not—”

"Screw that," she snapped. She sat down again and took his hands tight in her own.

"Let  _go_  once in a while," she pleaded. "Stop being so damn afraid of life off the battlefield. I don't care about your badass bounty hunter image, and I don't care what everyone else thinks about you. Just be  _yourself_."

"I  _can't_ ," he said through gritted teeth. "I... I don’t know who I am when not a bounty hunter. It’s all I’ve ever known. Battle and tactics and suspicion..."

He removed his hands from her grasp, wringing them and rubbing at his bare palms. “I wasn’t born for a life of peace, Brianna. No Mandalorian is. I can’t begin to imagine who I am without… _this_.”

"Then make something up!" Brianna cried, throwing her hands into the air. "You were able to become Cin Vhetin easily enough! Make someone new! Someone who doesn’t need to keep up appearances like this!"

"It's not that  _simple_!" Vhetin shouted, getting to his feet. "How could you expect to know me? How can you pretend to understand what I've been through, what I feel, when all you see is what I allow to slip to the surface?”

He seemed to swell larger and larger, like a snarling beast with hackles raised. “You think it’s so easy to turn away from everything you are? Everything you know? You have no idea!  _No idea!_ "

The room was suddenly silent, save for the distant sound of the bastion's power generator. Vhetin stood there, fists clenched, breathing hard. After a moment, though, all the anger vanished from his mind and his shoulders slumped. He fell heavily onto the couch again and rubbed at his eyes.

Brianna similarly fell back and turned her face away so he wouldn't see the tears welling in her eyes. But his sharp gaze rarely missed anything; he saw them just fine. He felt remorse begin to weed its way into his mind, but like all else he quickly crushed and discarded it.

Brianna spoke of just tossing away his identity, re-forging himself into someone new. But she had no idea how difficult it had been to build himself into Cin Vhetin in the first place. She was a talented huntress, her skill second only to the Mandalorians themselves. But she didn’t treat her talent the same as her mercenary counterparts. To her, bounty hunting was simply a job necessary to carry her to fame and riches. And once said riches were hers, she intended to retire to a simple life of leisure. Perhaps farming, perhaps training other would-be mercenaries in the ways of combat. But she knew her days of hunting contracts were numbered. Such a difference was the greatest reason she had not converted like so many other _aruetiise_ across the years.

Mandalorians held no such intentions. To a Mandalorian, blood and battle were not simply a job but a way of life. Even the most dedicated farmhand accepted that the path to honor and glory was one bought and paid for in the fires of conflict, and devotion to such conflict was expected of them from cradle to grave. Vhetin had long ago accepted this. Brianna had not.

He sighed. She just didn't  _understand_.

When she spoke again, her voice was shaking as she tried to keep her simultaneous disappointment and fury under her control.

"These past years, I...” her voice caught in her throat. “I've tried to help you. I've tried to carry some of your burden. But every time I try to get close to you, you push me away.”

She met his gaze. “Do you  _want_  to be alone? Is that it?"

Again, his mind supplied the wrong answer. "I have my reasons for what I do."

She stared at him for a few moments, as if desperately trying to digest his words. Then she shook her head and returned to her feet, moving with purpose for the door.

"Enjoy the  _tihaar_ ," she said in passing. A few moments later the reinforced durasteel entrance door crashed shut with a resounding  _boom_. He was left in overpowering, overwhelming silence.

His breath escaped in a long hiss of weariness. His head fell into his hands, eyes shut and fingers dug into his scalp so hard it hurt. Then he forcibly relaxed, once again banishing all thought of pain and shame from his mind. It was difficult, to be sure, but he succeeded. As he always succeeded.

He'd apologize the next time he saw her. He'd apologize, she'd apologize, they'd both forgive each other and then have another fight like this in a month or so. It was the cycle they'd fallen into these past few months. Brianna wasn't content with the relationship they had and Vhetin... well, he'd never been entirely comfortable with the pace of their relationship in the first place. It was a vicious circle they'd been fighting to escape for years now.

He scowled and picked up his helmet from the table before him, examining the tinted T-visor for a moment before placing it over his head and sealing his suit. The moment he did, he began feeling much better. Much calmer.

 _Much_   _emptier,_  the small voice of his conscience told him.  _Much_  lonelier.

"I didn't ask for this," he whispered to himself. "I didn't—"

 _But_   _you_  did.  _The_   _galaxy_   _made_   _you_   _what_   _you_   _are_   _today, but_   _you_   _certainly_   _helped_   _in_   _that_   _regard._

"I'm stronger than ever," he told himself, blinking as the familiar flash of amber light signaled that his HUD was booting up.

 _Stronger, yes. But_   _colder. More_   _detached. More_   _distant. You_   _love_   _Brianna, but_   _every_   _time_   _you_   _do_   _this_   _to_   _her, you_   _push her_   _further_   _away._

Did he love Brianna? His mind buzzed with confusion at the thought. Mandalorians were not so concerned with matters of the heart. He’d been taught to fight and kill and die when necessary, but never to properly open his heart and show compassion and care to others. Even now, he wasn't sure if the feelings that had been churning in him as she'd kissed him had been boundless love, meaningless lust, or simply the repayment of a debt long overdue.

There were so many things he didn't know these days. He was falling apart, dying on his feet. Every day that passed brought more anguish to his mind, more darkness that he had to forcibly toss aside just to get out of bed each morning. It was becoming harder and harder to be simply Cin Vhetin the bounty hunter, yet the longer he tried the more he knew there would be no one but that. He couldn't just forge a new identity like Brianna had said; the effort of finding his place in the galaxy and among the Mandalorians had almost killed him the first time. And he couldn't continue to deny his feelings as he had always done in the past. His mind screamed at him to succumb, but a life of alienation and isolation disturbed only by the endless conflict of bounty hunting was not what he wanted.

Eventually, a part of him would have to die. And whether that would be for better or worse was still the greatest lingering question that kept him going most days.

 _Who_   _can_   _I_   _be,_ he thought for what felt like the thousandth time,  _if_   _not_   _the_   _man_   _I_   _invented?_

He shook his head to clear it of such thoughts as he slung his rocket pack over his shoulders, preparing for imminent departure for Keldabe. Visions of the warm, comfortable  _Oyu'baat_  and the company of friends enticed his mind. Visions of a place where Cin Vhetin was enough for him and everyone around him.

It wasn't actually that bad of an idea to head down to the Crossroads of Keldabe. If anything, maybe Venku would be able to grant him some much-needed clarity.


	3. A Clandestine Contract

**_Oyu'baat_**   **tapcaf**

After fifteen long minutes of waiting, Venku Skirata slid into a booth with a roguish smirk, fashionably late as always. Vhetin looked up, pulling his helmeted head up from between his hands.

Venku was a few years younger than Vhetin's own age of twenty-two, though he had always carried himself with an air beyond his years. His strong, handsome face, short-cropped black hair, and the dark eyes of Jango Fett granted him the look of a man at least five years his senior.

The clone blood in him was unmistakable, but his biological family remained something of a mystery. His father was the clone renegade Darman Skirata, a man Vhetin had met only in passing. Exactly who his mother was, Vhetin had never dared to ask; he could tell it was a touchy subject for the entire Skirata Clan. Vhetin was not one to pry further. A Mandalorian and his clan, after all, were entitled to the privacy of their past.

Venku was currently dressed in his usual dark gray-red  _beskar'gam._ But unlike other Mandos who sported a singular color scheme, the young man prided himself on carrying a multitude of varied colors on his person. Even now he proudly carried a chrome silver shoulder pad, a golden right chest plate, and a dark blue gauntlet. The sight was far from uncommon among the residents of Keldabe. It was tradition among his people to wear a piece of a late loved one's armor in recognition of their memory. And when one had a family as large as the Skiratas... well, the young Venku had begun to grow quite a collection in the past years.

"Don't tell me she threw you out of your own house," the young man said. He set his helmet aside and fixed Vhetin with a sympathetic look. "I hope she knows she doesn't actually live there yet."

"No,” Vhetin said. “She just... kriff, I don't know..."

He fell silent, words failing him. Venku frowned and ordered two mugs of  _net'ra_   _gal_ from a nearby server, though he knew Vhetin would never remove his helmet in public to drink the beverage.

"So..." Venku said after the order was placed. "What exactly is the problem this time?"

Vhetin shrugged. "The usual; Brianna wants to take it to the next level, I want to pull back a few hundred steps. She’s… insistent."

"That's a tough situation."

Vhetin let out a dry chuckle. "Really? Tell me about it."

They sat in silence for a few minutes, during which Aramis brought two mugs of jet-black  _net'ra_   _gal_  to their table. As the ever-grim bartender left them to their beverages, Vhetin frowned beneath his helmet wrapped his fingers around the frosty mug.

"Do you think that I've killed myself?"

Venku frowned, not understanding. "You're sitting right here,  _vod_. So I wouldn't think so, no."

"Not like that.” Vhetin grimaced. “Bri thinks that when I started bounty hunting, I killed who I had been before. That I destroyed every hope of a life beyond the hunt.”

He looked up, glad that the barrier of his helmet masked his apprehension. “Do you think she's right?"

Venku shrugged. "I'm not going to lie. You're one cold-hearted bastard, Vhetin."

"Thanks," he replied glumly.

"Let me finish. You are pretty cold, but as far as killing  _everything_... I'm not so sure. I mean, _I_ haven’t given up on you yet."

Vhetin glanced up at the other Mandalorian. "What do you mean?"

"Well, I can't say whether you two are in love or not. And honestly it's not my place to say, even if I could.” He settled onto his forearms and cocked his head. “But when I see you with Brianna, I can tell you care about her. It's written all across the both of you and almost impossible to miss.”

He raised a single accusatory eyebrow. “Whether you allow _yourself_ to see it is another issue."

"That's just the thing," Vhetin insisted. "I don't  _know_  if I love her. I can't tell."

"Then you'll just have to rely on the opinion of an outsider," Venku replied with a slight grin. "So I'll say it for you. You want to win her back?”

“Yes.”

“Then take her out more often than every other month and for  _te_   _Manda_ 's sake, take her anywhere but the  _Oyu'baat_. Take a vacation for a few weeks to Naboo or Alderaan or somewhere romantic like that. Or just buy her some blood lilies. That alone would make her happy. She didn’t name her ship after them for no reason, you know."

Vhetin scowled. His relationship with Bri was quickly spiraling down the 'fresher and he didn't know if he had what it took to salvage anything from it. Yet Venku's opinion was sound advice; he needed to step up and treat Brianna with the love she deserved, even if it wasn't quite the love he actually felt yet. Maybe, given time, he'd actually work his way up to that.

"Venku, has anyone ever told you that you would make a good relationship counselor?"

The other man laughed. "Nah, I wouldn't have time to do that. I have too many fems of my own to chase after. It's like the bounty hunting of a hopeless romantic.” He smirked. “Only I'm not so hopeless."

"And how's goes such a hunt? Any more women come at you with knives?"

"Not since the girl in the silver armor, no," he said, wincing at the memory. "How was I supposed to know she was married?"

“Maybe the fact that she said, _I am married?_ ”

He shrugged and tapped at his ear. “I misheard her. Tinnitus is the scourge of Mandalorians everywhere, you know.”

"Jaing and Mereel were a horrible influence on you when you were growing up."

"I know.” Venku shot him his trademark smile, all sharp charm and sharper wits. “But nothing I can do about it now, is there? I might as well enjoy such corruption while I can. Speaking of which…"

As if on cue, a beautiful blonde woman in dull gold armor walked past the booth. Venku's head turned to follow her and he quickly left his seat without a word, following close in pursuit.

Vhetin watched as his friend stopped the woman just outside the tapcaf door. He noticed a number of the tapcaf's patrons watching intently as well; a few were even laying down bets as to whether Venku's charms would be successful. The two seemed to exchange a few words — Venku grinning while the woman's face remained unreadable. Then the woman pulled her arm back and punched Venku in the gut with the force and vigor of a firing piston. Venku doubled over even in full armor, coughing and falling to his knees to the cobblestone of the plaza outside. The woman coolly continued on her way, disappearing down the street after granting her would-be suitor a parting kick in the ribs.

Vhetin watched with a smirk of his own as Venku limped back into the tapcaf. As he entered, still holding his stomach, the bar erupted into sympathetic applause and good-natured calls of, "Maybe next time,  _Kad'ika_ ,” and, “She gave you what you deserved, young one.”

Venku was something of a favorite among the local _Mando'ade,_ and with good reason. For months he'd been pushing for Fenn Shysa and his supercommandos to discharge the Empire from Mandalorian space, advocating for a free and independent Homeworld as had been the case during the days of the Republic. It was a proposition most other Mandalorians approved, Vhetin included. In the eyes of the local population, Venku — known by his affectionate nickname of _Kad_ _’ika_ or _Little Sword —_ was one of the few with the guts to publicly voice the opinion of the people. Since voicing such opinions, he had become known as something of an unofficial spokesman of the people and an all-around good guy with _Manda_ _’yaim’s_ best interests at heart. Such acclaim won him many points with the locals, including Keldabe’s most eligible bachelorettes, and that fame suited Venku just fine.

Said spokesman slid back into the booth with a sheepish grimace, wincing as he held his stomach. Vhetin stared at him for a moment with a sympathetic frown.

"That was a hell of a punch," he observed. It took some muscle to wind a fully-armored  _Mando_.

"Yes it was," Venku agreed with a grimace. "I don't think I'll be able to show my face in the streets for a while after a beating like that.”

"I know her," Vhetin said, jerking his head in the yellow-armored woman’s direction. "You keep harassing her and she'll put a boot up your  _shebs_ before you can blink. Just a warning."

"You know her?" Venku said, craning his neck to look after her as well. "You think you could put in a good word for me?"

His question was met with a blank stare. After a time, the young Mando raised his hands in defeat and said, "All right, all right. I forgot who I was talking to. Never mind."

They turned to their drinks for a time, Venku drinking deeply and Vhetin simply staring into the depths of his mug. He listened to the banter and bustle of the bar, all too eager to lose himself in the comforts of familiar sights and sounds.

The door to the tapcaf opened again, but this time Venku didn't bother to turn. Vhetin, however, recognized the newcomers and nodded as Jay, Rame, and Jaing spotted him and made their way towards his booth. He quickly moved over to make room for his partner.

"Take a seat," he said, offering the place next to him.

Jay collapsed into the seat with an exhausted sigh and a happy grin, setting her pilot's gloves aside. "Thanks. We've been up in orbit all day test-flying those Skyraptors. I've never  _seen_  such incredible ships!"

" _Vengeance_  is handling well then?”

Jay's eyes sparkled with admiration. "Vhetin, that ship is  _amazing_! A Class Four hyperspace-capable starfighter, with better shields and engines than any fighter in the damned  _Imperial_  fleet.” She sat back with a laugh. “She turns on a hairpin and can easily take on a full squad of TIEs with all her weapons! I could kiss Ume'o just for  _making_  the karking thing!"

Venku looked about to say something in response, then blushed and abruptly closed his mouth. Jay shot him a smile in greeting and he quickly turned a few shades darker and returned it with hesitant sheepishness. He looked instantly smitten.

"Oh," Vhetin said when he saw his friend's helpless expression, "I forgot to make the introductions. Jay, this is Venku Skirata, an old friend. Venku, this is my new partner, Jay."

Venku dazedly reached out to shake her hand. Jay smiled at him and said, "Pleased to meet you."

"I think I love you," Venku mumbled dazedly, his eyes almost as wide as the  _Oyu'baat_ 's serving plates.

Vhetin snorted, his helmet vocoder thankfully switched off, while Jaing had to turn away, clamping a hand over his mouth. Jay frowned in confusion and said, "I'm sorry?"

Venku shook his head as if to clear it of stupid thoughts and stammered, "Uh... I mean, it's nice to meet you as well."

Jay raised an eyebrow. “Do you tell everyone you love them when you first meet? Or is that just a Mandalorian thing?”

“A Venku thing,” the young man replied with a sheepish smile. He was almost as red as a torquat fruit now. “Sorry. Sometimes I can’t hear what I’m saying.”

“Slip of the tongue?”

“Tinnitus,” he replied evenly.

Jaing staggered away towards the front bar, still trying to hold back guffaws. Rame followed him, motioning for him to shut up.

Vhetin wasn't surprised at Venku's fascination with Jay’s looks. Long brown hair fell loosely over her shoulders, framing lightly tanned skin, dark eyes, and a quick smile. She was certainly attractive, but also sported an ever-present hint of toughness beneath her beautiful exterior. It was was one of the reasons Vhetin had considered training her to be a bounty hunter in the first place. But for the time being at least, he knew his partner had eyes only for her new starship. Compared to a hyperspace-capable Class Four starfighter with quad-mounted ion engines and hairpin maneuverability, Venku didn’t stand a chance.

Venku seemed to recover some semblance of a mind and cleared his throat. "So," he began, "uh, you've been flying those new Skyraptors? I'm surprised Um'eo even let you near his babies."

"I own one," Jay replied, not without pride. "It was a gift."

Venku raised an eyebrow at Vhetin, who shrugged and said, "I came within a micrometer of death and she saved my life. She shot Kassh in the back right before he could cleave my head in two. It was the least I could do to repay her."

"Wow," Venku said, looking to Jay with an impressed gaze. "So you have beauty  _and_  brawn. Very impressive."

Vhetin's HUD suddenly chimed and a single light blue icon flashed in the upper corner of the holographic display. He had an incoming message. Unknown caller.

"Excuse me," he said, moving to stand up. "You two go ahead and keep talking. I have a message I have to take."

Jay stood up to allow Vhetin out, then took her seat again. Venku didn’t bother giving Vhetin a farewell and instead turned back to Jay, staring at her with almost reverent attention.

"And how are you liking Mandalore so far?"

"It's very nice," she replied. "I think I can honestly say it's nothing like I expected."

"You'd be surprised how often we hear that around here."

Vhetin didn't wait to listen to the rest of the conversation. His HUD was still chiming insistently and demanding his attention, so he left the cantina and activated the icon. He didn't recognize the ID number, so he treated the message with some degree of caution.

"Identify yourself," he said, cutting straight to the point.

" _Turn right and walk down two blocks_ ," replied a quiet voice over the comm channel. " _You'll receive further instructions from there._ "

Vhetin scowled. "I don't take directions over comms. Identify yourself."

" _Calm down, Vhetin_ ," the voice replied, and now Vhetin almost thought he recognized it. " _I'm not trying to lure you away to slit your throat. Just follow the directions. I can't be seen in public right now._ "

Vhetin frowned, unhappy with such information, but cautiously obeyed the directions. He walked down two blocks and waited on the street corner for further instructions.

" _Good_ ," the voice said after a moment. " _Now turn around and walk down the alley._ "

Vhetin did as commanded. He was halfway down the dirty, damp alley when a dark figure emerged from a door in one building. Vhetin squinted, trying to see the being through the shadows. It wasn’t hard. After a moment of recognition, he relaxed.

"Sazh," he said with a sigh as he moved his hand from the butt of his pistol. "What the hell is your problem?"

Sazh Kisaragi looked past Vhetin's shoulder, checking to see if he was being followed, then stepped fully into view. Unlike his black-armored companion, Kisaragi kept his hand on the blaster pistol holstered on his belt and kept glancing over his shoulder in self-conscious suspicion.

He was still much like Vhetin remembered from previous encounters. His armor was painted in dark colors, battered black armor plates sporadically painted with flashes of blue and green. Many of the plates were also inscribed with Mando'a runes along his chest and stomach. It was a rare and iconic addition to his _beskar'gam_ ; the near-indestructible armor was next to impossible to engrave once forged, and very few  _beskar_  workers even attempted it. That meant the hunter had either paid top-credit for his armor or he'd inscribed the runes himself.

Vhetin knew it had been the latter case. And his character was not unknown among his fellow Mandalorians; Kisaragi was well known as one of the best private investigators in Keldabe due to his time as a Coruscant CSF officer at the beginning of the Clone Wars. He was a dedicated and capable warrior, worthy of both trust and affection.

Probably his most impressive trait, however, was his left arm. It had been lost in an accident many years ago and he'd since replaced it with a self-made mechanical prosthetic. The iron arm came complete with a custom  _shuk'orok_  crushgaunt design and razor blades sprouting from the arm's metallic fingertips. With it, the man could literally crush a beam of durasteel to dust, and it was a favorite drinking game at the  _Oyu'baat_  for new  _Mando_  recruits to test their strength against his augmented power. To this day, he'd never been defeated.

“So what’s with all the secrecy?” Vhetin asked. “I don’t like sneaking around in the shadows.”

The older man stepped back and put his hands on his armored hips. "I'm undercover at the moment. Can’t show my face on the streets. I'm taking a huge risk just coming back to Keldabe, but I have a job for you."

Vhetin immediately shook his head. "Sorry Sazh, but I just got back from a hunt like a week ago. I have business in Keldabe and-"

" _Listen_ ," Kisaragi hissed, his voice sounding gravely and threatening over his helmet's vocoder. "It's important. Besides, you owe me."

"If this is about the whole fiasco on Cato Nemoidia, I keep telling you that-"

"You would have fallen hundreds of kilometers to splat on the rocks if not for me," Kisaragi pressed. "Jetpack or no. I don’t care if you object, you owe me.

"Besides," he said, fishing in one of his belt-pouches for something, "it's not like I expect you to work gratis. There's a reward in play, like all your usual contracts."

Vhetin sighed, shook his head, but reluctantly listened as Kisaragi produced a palm-sized holoprojector. "I just got the word myself three days ago,” he explained, “and I knew right away that it was a threat that needed attending."

"What?" Vhetin asked with a frown "What's a threat?"

"Jolee Uruc," Kisaragi replied, projecting up the rotating image of a short, angry-looking woman with a mechanical arm and long hair hung in dreadlocks. "She's a terrorist based out of Mon Calamari.”

“Mon Cal is a hotspot of anti-Imperial activity,” Vhetin observed. “The locals are almost as defiant as we are. What makes her so special?”

“I was tracking down some illicit arms deals in that sector. I found that all the weapons were going to her and her organization, the Thirteen Warriors."

"So?" Vhetin said, shrugging. "Drug lords, murderers, terrorists, it's all in a day's work for a  _Mando'ad_. Why do you need me on the job? Seems well within your area of expertise."

"You misunderstand," Kisaragi said quietly. "I'm going after the  _leader_  of this weapon-smuggling operation, not his clients. Uruc is outside my concern. But even so, she’s dangerous and the Empire wants her in chains. I figured you'd want a piece of the action before she draws some  _serious_ attention."

At Vhetin's blank stare, Kisaragi sighed and said, "You want me to spell it out? Before F-E-T-T gets wind of it."

"I know what you meant." Vhetin folded his arms across his chest, raising an eyebrow beneath his helmet. As much as he hated to admit it, Kisaragi's proposition had caught his interest. "How'd you find out she was there? It could be a decoy."

"So you  _are_  interested?"

"Just trying to save you some legwork when  _you_  get off your  _shebs_  and go after her. I’m not one to scoop contracts from other hunters." He tapped his shoulder pad with two fingers, a sign of impatience. “How did you find out where she was?”

Kisaragi stared at him for a moment; a stare Vhetin held steadily. It wasn’t long before the other Mando relented.

"I was tracking a shipment of SpecOps blaster rifles from Kuat to Coruscant. DC-17s. Fancy stuff. But in the past, the shipping convoy had been raided by pirates. And not just your average goons. Serious, organized raiders.”

“Not uncommon along the Kuati trade routes,” Vhetin said. “A lot of profit can be made for pirates brave enough to take on Imperial guns.”

“You speak from experience?” Kisaragi raised an eyebrow.

“I’m a man of many talents.” Vhetin made it clear he wouldn’t elucidate further. “Continue your story.”

Kisaragi was happy to oblige. “The raid was interrupted by Imperial reinforcements halfway through and the pirates had to leave before they got all the guns. Everyone knew that it was a good bet they'd come back to finish the job, so I marked the guns with micro-transmitters and sent the convoy anyway, hoping to lure the pirates out and track them to their base."

"Let me guess," Vhetin said, raising an eyebrow. "They raided the convoy again?"

"Killed two shipping captains," Kisagari said, a tinge of regret coming into his voice, "and somehow the transmitters deactivated the moment the pirates had their hands on them. Two weeks later, they show up in the hands of Uruc and her Thirteen Warriors.”

“Suspicious.”

“Indeed. There's illegal arms trading going on down on Mon Cal, maybe even something as big as an underground black market. And Uruc's right at the heart of it. You take her out, and the rest of the network collapses. No more customers means the dealers pack up and ship out, right into my sights."

“I have no quarrel with the underworld,” Vhetin pointed out. “Why would I want to dismantle a black market, even if it exists?”

“Because the Empire is willing to pay handsomely for it, of course. They have a personal stake in such affairs, so they’re offering a hefty sum for her capture and arrest. And it smells to me like there’s more going on than just a terrorist hunt.”

"Hmm," Vhetin said, rubbing at his armored collar. "Makes sense. If these Thirteen Warriors are sneaking restricted weapons past the portside cargo inspectors, they must have Imperial help. A mole, helping them from within."

"That's what I thought," Kisagari said, nodding. "And I figured that you'd be the perfect one for the job, considering your... ah, rough history with the Imps. If anyone needed to diss some heat and score points with the New Order, I figure it’s you and your pretty partner."

Vhetin grunted noncommittally. "What's the price?"

"Ten thousand alive."

He let out a low whistle. "Tempting, but who's posting it? Your CSF buddies?"

"Imperial Intelligence," Kisaragi replied, sounding apologetic.

Vhetin sighed again and half-turned away. "Come on, man. You know I don't like taking Imperial bounties, and _especially_ not when they're posted by I.I."

"Just hear me out," Kisaragi said. "Read the brief. You might change your mind."

A few moments later a loading window appeared on Vhetin's HUD and decoding algorithms scrolled across it. A bounty information file popped up soon after:

 _Bounty: Open_   _(available_   _to_   _any_   _who_   _wish_   _to_   _make_   _a_   _capture_   _attempt)_

 _Name: Jolee_   _Uruc_

_Species: Human_

_Sex: Female_

_Last_   _known_   _location: Mon_   _Calamari, Equatorial_   _Islands, Saiton_   _City_

 _Bounty_   _Originator: Imperial_   _Intelligence, Section_   _Nine, Subsection_   _Fourteen-A_  " _Sorren_ _”_   _Section_   _(Imperial_   _Security Division)_

 _Appearance: Short_ _human_   _female_   _with_   _dark_   _skin, long_   _black_   _hair_   _worn_   _in_   _dreadlocks, and_   _brown_   _eyes. One mechanical_   _arm_   _outfitted_   _with_   _powerful_   _high-heat_   _flamethrower. Subject_   _is_   _to_   _be_   _considered_   _armed_   _and_   _extremely dangerous_   _at_   _all_   _times._

 _Brief: Wanted_   _for_   _the_   _death_   _and_   _mutilation_   _of_   _an_   _Imperial_   _Admiral_   _(see_   _attached_   _report, section_   _6-573-218, pages_   _3-6) as_   _well_   _as_   _connections_   _to_   _several_   _terror_   _cells_   _based_   _out_   _of_   _Weequay-controlled_   _systems. Terror_   _cells_   _aimed_   _at_   _the destruction_   _of_   _Imperial_   _army_   _bases_   _and_   _supply_   _depots. Said_   _bounty_   _is_   _also_   _responsible_   _for_   _the_   _creation_   _of_   _her_   _own terror_   _cell, the_   _Thirteen_   _Warriors, and_   _for_   _killing_   _and_   _maiming at_   _least_   _forty-eight_   _Imperial_   _citizens, including_   _said_   _Admiral. Also involved_   _in_   _the_   _massacre_   _of_   _several_   _Mon_   _Cal_   _family_   _communities_   _(see_   _appendix_   _B-28-R, Section_   _III, paragraphs_   _12-14). Most_   _recently_   _tied_   _to_   _the_   _infiltration_   _of_   _Mon_   _Calamari_   _Garrison_   _Command_   _and_   _the_   _murder_   _of_   _twenty_   _hostages_   _during said_   _infiltration._

 _Reward: 10,000_   _GSCs_   _(Galactic_   _Standard_   _Credits) (alive) - 4,000_   _GSCs_   _(dead)_

Accompanying the file was a prison holo-record of the same angry woman, with a stump where her right arm should have been. Vhetin carefully read the bounty file, as well as the attached reports, then murmured, "Interesting..."

He fed the file into the analysis program in his helmet's data system. After some more calculations scrolled across his HUD, a message popped up:

 _Danger_   _rating: Class_   _7_   _(Extreme_   _caution_   _advised. Aggressive_   _behavior_   _on_   _behalf_   _of_   _the_   _hunter_   _is_   _highly recommended.)_

He nodded to himself and inquired, "Why exactly does Armand Isard want her brought in? Last I checked, the good Director has loftier concerns than a fledgling Mon Cal terrorist cell."

"Besides the fact that she's killed a bunch of Imperials and who knows how many Mon Cal families?" Kisaragi said, sounding irritated. His face was unreadable behind his helmet's black T-visor, but Vhetin could hear the impatience in the Mandalorian's voice. "She's nothing but a butcher and that doesn't fit with the Emperor's vision for the galaxy. His Majesty doesn't like troublemakers, and therefore I.I. doesn't like troublemakers.

“More than that,” he said with a noncommittal sniff, “Uruc is a show boater. Likes to take the spotlight, likes each attack to be bigger and flashier than the last. Is it any wonder she’s drawn the attention of folks with _loftier concerns_?”

"Fine. I'll take the job. But after this, consider us even."

Kisaragi nodded and clasped Vhetin's forearm in a  _Mando_  handshake. " _Vor'e, vod_. You've just made my day. And I'm sure the grunts down at Mon Cal Imp Command will thank you too."

"Yeah, yeah," Vhetin grumbled good-naturedly. Despite Kisaragi's rather annoying talent for remembering every little favor owed to him, Vhetin rather liked the man. He was tough, loyal, and a good warrior. Not much more was needed for  _Mando'ade_  to get along. "But if I get shot again during this mission, it's your head I'm coming after next."

He fished in his belt-pouches. "How much do you charge for finder's fees, huh? Seven hundred? Eight?"

It was tradition for a hunter's informants to be rewarded for their information, even when the informants were fellow hunters. It showed respect for the time and effort the finder went through to supply the hunter. There were some, like the Journeyman Protector Tarron Matele, who made a decent living scouting out potentially rewarding bounties for their associates. And the bigger the bounty, the bigger the finder's fee.

But when he looked up he found Kisaragi gone, leaving him standing in just another dirty, filth-strewn back alley. He frowned at Kisaragi's theatrics, then turned and headed back to the cantina. It didn’t take long to return to his companions in the bar. He approached the table where he'd left Venku and Jay, reading over Uruc's bounty file again as he walked.

"And the Imperials branded you a traitor anyway?" Venku was saying, still staring at Jay. "They don't know how stupid they were. They need more pretty faces in their ranks. I think more people would listen to them if they did."

Jay shot him a warning look, though there was a telling glint of humor in her eye. "You're flattering me."

"I most certainly am not—"

"Sorry to interrupt," Vhetin said, stopping at the table, "but Jay, we've got a new assignment."

“Another one?” She looked up at him and quizzically tipped her head to one side. "Who is it now?"

He gestured for her to follow him. "I'll brief you on the way. But we need to move out."

She stood as she shook Venku's hand again. "It was very nice to meet you, Mr. Skirata," she said with a warm smile.

"It was nice to meet you as well," Venku said, craning his neck to watch her as she left. He looked crestfallen as the door shut behind them, then reluctantly turned back to his drink.

As they left the tapcaf, Jay hurried to keep up with her partner’s brisk pace. She almost ran headlong into a muscular Weequay headed for the  _Oyu'baat_  and had to swerve to avoid the spiny alien.

"So who's the target this time?" she asked. "Kassh didn't escape again, did he?"

"Kassh had been executed," Vhetin said. "He won't be causing us any more problems."

“Oh,” she said, shocked by his nonchalance. "So who are you eying this time?"

"A human female by the name of Jolee Uruc." He transmitted the bounty's file to her datapad for later inspection. "A terrorist hiding out on Mon Calamari. Imperial Intelligence has issued a bounty on her head for ten thousand credits."

She let out a low whistle. "They must really want her taken down."

"A small number of her victims were Imperial military personnel, so they're naturally doing everything short of mobilizing an invasion force."

"Is it smart, going after an Imperial bounty? Seeing as we're both teetering on the brink of being wanted criminals?"

"The Empire doesn't monitor the bounty hunters in their employ," he explained. "At least not as long as they behave themselves. Their opinion is that you're either with them or an enemy. As long as we're able to bring Uruc in, they shouldn't bother us much."

"Are you sure?" Jay sounded uncertain. "That doesn't sound like the Empire I know."

"That's because you've only worked with the Navy. This bounty was posted by Imperial Intelligence. They're much shadier than the mainstream, barely a part of the Empire at all, seeing as they bend so many rules to accomplish their goals." He shrugged. "They won't even tell the higher-ups that we were the ones who took up the contract. They'll just pay us and say their target was tracked down by specially-appointed agents of Imperial justice."

Jay grimaced nonetheless. "I don't like the idea of helping the people that branded me a traitor and threw me in prison for no reason."

“I’m not exactly jumping for joy either. Imperial Intelligence is dangerous as employers go, and I like to keep a healthy distance between myself and Imperial guns when possible.” Vhetin glanced at her as they walked across the small plaza outside the  _Oyu'baat_. "But this Uruc woman is a mass murderer. We aren't doing just the Empire a favor; if we refuse, how many more people will she kill before someone else works up the courage to bring her down?"

"I guess that's a good point," she admitted. "So even though we'd be working for the Empire... we'd still be doing the right thing?"

"Justice can be served in many ways," he said, then turned his gaze back to the street ahead of him. They paused at a road crossing as a dark red speeder flashed by, kicking up a cloud of smoke and dust and making his black-gray  _kama_  flutter in its wake.

"I think I understand. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, right?"

He frowned at the cliché, though he knew she couldn't see it through the confines of his helmet. "Not true. The enemy of your enemy is never  _ever_  your friend.”

He felt compelled to clarify, “But enemies can occasionally suspend their hatred of each other - for a short time - while they work together to deal with a common threat. And once the job's done, they go back to killing each other like before.”

Jay nodded. "Okay. So we're only working for the Empire to get rid of Uruc, then it's back to business as usual?"

"Exactly. Uruc is a wild card in an already-dangerous galaxy. People like her can cause untold destruction both in what they do and what they say. And it sounds like Uruc has a fairly large group of followers already."

"Thugs?"

"Fellow terrorists."

She shook her head with a short chuckle. "You certainly know how to pick the wacky ones, Vhetin. First Kassh, now this psycho."

"I've been working at this for a long time. I know what to look for."

"You  _deliberately_  look for homicidal maniacs?" Her voice sounded skeptical. "You're even crazier than Brianna says you are."

He winced inwardly at the reminder of Bri, then shrugged and waited as another speeder flashed down the street. "The _wacky ones_ are worth more money. Normal, down-to-dirt money launderers aren't exactly a high priority for our employers. A psycho who thinks he's Darth Vader just because he's whacked a bunch of people's heads off with a lightsaber? You bet he's worth more cash."

"Why? You'd think the dangerous ones would be the quiet ones. The ones who  _don't_  draw attention to themselves."

"Sometimes they jack a decent price onto their heads, yeah," Vhetin admitted. "But the ones who are quiet can be taken down with equal silence; behind-the-scenes, you know how it is. If the ones who are screaming out at the top of their lungs are suddenly taken out...”

He shrugged. “More people listen to martyrs than to preachers."

"I understand.”

This was one lesson he hadn't expected her to grasp right away. "You do?"

"Yeah," she said. "Well, kind of. When I was just a kid on Corellia, we had this crazy neighbor. A real psycho. She kept spouting this nonsense about the death of the Republic and the end of civilization as we knew it. She kept shouting that Chancellor Palpatine was an evil puppetmaster who was going to take over the galaxy."

"She was a perceptive psycho."

"Yeah, well, the Emperor apparently thought so too. A few months after she started this little escapade, she died mysteriously in a _freak speeder accident_."

She frowned thoughtfully as they cut down a side ally to the spaceports. "It was only after she disappeared that people actually started to believe her. And after the Supreme Chancellor actually _did_ declare himself Emperor, of course. And when I entered the Navy, I looked up her record. Turns out she used to work on the Republic Political Advisory Panel. So she had access to all kinds of information and data that you and I wouldn't even begin to dream of. If anyone had the access to information exposing Palpatine as the power-hungry barve he is, it would have been her."

She shrugged. "It's weird, but true."

Vhetin let out a short laugh. "I underestimated you. You've had more than your fair share of illegal run-ins already."

"With the Empire looming over everyone's heads," Jay said, glaring at a stormtrooper standing guard on a nearby street corner, "I think innocence is becoming a rare qualities these days."

Oya  _to_   _that,_  Vhetin silently agreed as they crossed over to another street. He paused at the next street corner and said, "You go ahead and get  _Vengeance_  prepped for outbound flight. I have a few calls to make, then I'll join you."

Jay nodded. "Don't be late. We're on a schedule now, remember? Our lead won't last long."

She wasn’t wrong. After a few days out in the open, most bounty hunters flooded toward assignments like razor sharks in a feeding frenzy. And he had no desire for a repeat of Kassh's bounty, even if they'd gained an ally in Kalyn Farnmir because of it.

"Just be ready," he said, then headed down a side passage. As soon as he emerged onto another street, he opened a private comm channel to a number that was at the top of the list in his HUD's database.

After five hailing beeps the message switched over to record mode. It was clear Bri didn't want to talk. So he sighed and at the tone, he began, "Bri, I know you probably don't want anything to do with me at the moment, so I won't waste your time. I just got a lead on a new assignment, and I'm heading out to Mon Calamari.”

He took a deep breath and soldiered on. “I should be gone for a few days, a week at most... I don't know exactly how long it'll be because this bounty sounds like a bit of a handful. It's some terrorist from Mon Cal named Uruc and the Imperials are-"

Suddenly Brianna's voice was on the other end of the channel. " _What_?" she said breathlessly. " _What did you just say?_ "

Vhetin paused, frowning at her odd behavior. "Bri? Is that you?"

" _Of course it's me you numbskull. Now what did you just say?_ "

"I'm going after a bounty," he slowly repeated, still confused. "Jolee Uruc."

There was a long pause over the comm, then Bri said, " _Where are you?_ "

"Headed to the spaceport," he said. "Bri, what's gotten into you?"

" _No time to explain_ ," she said. There was a sound of a scuffle from the other end. It sounded like she was throwing things into a bag or backpack.

" _Don't leave just yet_ ," she said. " _I'm coming with you._ "

"What?" he said,  _really_  confused now. "I... I thought you were-"

" _I'll see you in fifteen_ ," she said curtly, then cut the comm channel. Vhetin stared at the comlink icon on his HUD, then closed the window, shook his head and moved on.

~~~~~~~~

**Later**

Vhetin took a seat in the pilot's chair and began the pre-flight system check. As he let the computer run through its program, he put his hands behind his head and gazed out the front view panels.

Jay was striding around her new ship in the spaceport outside, checking for anything out of place. She pulled a panel up from the right side of the ship and leaned in until her entire upper half was obscured by the silvered bulkhead. Then she backed out and pulled the hatch down again, slapping the side of the ship with an open palm for good luck. Her pre-flight checkout finished, she swung up into the cockpit with a well-practiced motion and sealed the cabin. After a few moments, Vhetin saw  _Vengeance_ 's engines glow to a blinding yellow. The ship lifted off and blasted away into the sky with a lingering scream of ion engines, not dissimilar to the screech of a departing TIE fighter.

With a slower warm-up sequence, the heavier, bulkier _Void_  followed her in heading for high orbit. The space around the planet was relatively clear of ships, making it easy to navigate toward the minimum safe distance for hyperspace jumps.

It was a relief to have the  _Triumphant_  — the Star Destroyer that had stopped in the Mandalore system for a month-long tour of duty — finally out of the picture. Vhetin cracked a grin as he remembered the celebration that had taken place when the news had trickled down that the Destroyer was finally moving out. Aramis had held a special first-drink-free party at the  _Oyu'baat_ , the local Holonews team had sent out a viddroid to broadcast a 24-hour countdown to the capital ship's departure, and there had been everything but open partying in the streets.

Without a mobile base like an SD, the Imperials didn't have such a tight hold on ingoing and outgoing ships. Everyone found it a gift that the Imps weren't scrutinizing every traveler going to and from the planet, especially Jay. Even though Vhetin and Jaing Skirata had crafted her a new identity that would hold up under Imperial investigation — she was now Jaimie Moqena, a bounty huntress who'd grown up on the congested moon of Nar Shadda — she was still nervous around Imperials. Vhetin couldn't blame her; the Imps were persistent with their revenge if anything.  _He_  certainly didn't enjoy being on their hit list.

He tapped the comm transmitter and dialed out  _Vengeance_ 's comm number. After the first hail, Jay activated her end and said, " _What's up?_ "

"Just wanted to give you a heads-up," he replied. "We aren't going to be the only ones on this mission."

" _Oh kriff. Not more competition?_ "

"Not exactly. Just another hunter who's expressed an interest in working with us."

" _Who?_ "

As if on cue, the ugly box shape of  _Blood_   _Lily_  swooped into view with a deep and thunderous roar. The comm crackled as another speaker tied into the channel and Brianna's smooth voice said, " _I've decided to tag along on this one. Got a problem with that?_ "

" _Brianna?_ " Jay said. " _I thought you liked to work alone. Why the sudden change of heart?_ "

There was a long pause over the comm. Then Bri said, " _I have a score to settle with Uruc. Let's just leave it at that, Rookie._ "

Jay huffed and signed off her end of the comm. She clearly hated the nickname everyone was giving her. She had proved time and again that she didn't like being the odd one out. She liked being a part of the group, and constantly being referred to as _the Rookie_ just ground at her nerves.

" _Do you have any contacts on Mon Cal?_ " Bri asked him, her voice pointedly formal. Vhetin's gaze hardened at the sound. So despite her earlier excitement, she was still angry with him after all. That was too bad.

"No," he replied, equally coolly. "Not anyone that actually lives there."

There was a slight pause over the comm. " _Fine. I've got someone we can see. But when we get there, follow_ my  _lead, all right? And make sure the Rookie does too._ "

"Any particular reason?"

" _Let's say he's a little skittish. Especially when his clients come to meet him face-to-face._ "

She signed off the comm without further word and  _Blood_   _Lily_  swooped in front of him, rotating slowly to line up with the appropriate hyperspace lane. With a detonation of light and a silent pulse of sound that was swallowed by the void of space, the ship rocketed into lightspeed and accelerated so fast it vanished in the blink of an eye.

 _Vengeance_  quickly followed, racing off into the endless abyss in a flash of blue and white. Vhetin let the nav computer take control of his ship's navigation systems from there, sitting back as the ship rotated to line up with the hyperspace lane to Mon Calamari. A single quiet beep informed him that the ship was ready for the jump.

He pulled a lever on the control panel, then was jerked back in his seat from the acceleration as the stars blurred to streaks and the ship blasted into the warped bluish tunnel of hyperspace.

With the first leg of the journey effectively over, he straightened himself and pushed away from the command console. He wouldn't arrive for a few hours yet, so he had some time to relax. Maybe he'd think up how he was going to make things right with Brianna. Or maybe where he'd start this hunt. Or how he was going to keep the airborne sea salts out of  _Void_ 's oxygen scrubbers when they arrived. Or-

He shook his head and frowned as he left the cockpit. Sometimes it felt as if he needed two more Vhetins just to accomplish everything the one needed to get done.

 _Then_   _again,_  he thought dryly,  _life_   _wouldn't_   _be_   _so_   _interesting_   _if_   _it_   _wasn't_   _so_   _challenging, would_   _it?_

**Author's note: Sazh Kisaragi appears courtesy of Lightning-Kisaragi on DeviantArt .com**


	4. To Mon Calamari

**Later**

It was a few hours of boring waiting before  _Vengeance_ 's navicomputer informed Jay that she was nearing her destination. She started from a half-doze and glanced around, rubbing her tired eyes as she checked her ship's systems. Everything was in order, just like the last seventeen times she'd checked them.

 _That's_   _the_   _downside_   _of_   _flying_   _a_   _hyperspace-capable_   _fighter,_  she thought, shifting to a more comfortable position in the small cockpit,  _instead_   _of_   _a_   _full-blown_   _transport_   _like_   _Vhetin_   _or_   _Brianna; there's_   _nothing_   _to_  do  _during_   _hyperspace_   _travel. I_   _need_   _to_   _remember_   _to_   _pack_   _a_   _holovid_   _or_   _something_   _to_   _keep_   _me_   _occupied._

The navicomputer informed her she was exactly one minute from Mon Calamari. Jay readied herself for hyperspace exit, triple-checking that the ship was under the navicomputer's control so it would pull  _Vengeance_  out of hyperspace before she tunneled herself through the planet at lightspeed. Human reflexes, no matter how fast, physically couldn't keep up with hyperspacial speeds.

A white light on the side of the small black box of the navicomputer began blinking at an almost blinding pace and, with a surge of deceleration, the stars resolved from blurry, whirling blobs to their normal twinkling pinpoints. She grunted as the force of the deceleration threw her forward against her crash webbing.

“Not the smoothest exit,” she murmured to herself. “I’ll have to recalibrate the nav box next chance I get.”

She took a moment to glance around the space into which she had emerged, gathering her bearings before setting off. The huge blue-green globe of Mon Calamari hung in the lower right corner of the viewport, dwarfing all else in view. She saw a massive orb of blue-green ocean, paler blue arctic waters, and small clusters of minuscule islands around the equator, all swathed in pale white and gray clouds that seemed to envelop the entirety of the planet's atmosphere. The clouds warped and mottled its surface, gathering particularly around a quadrant to the northeast — a growing hurricane. Jay’s nav beacon claimed her destination wasn’t far from that mass of turbulence.

The space around them was surprisingly calm. Odd. Usually Mon Cal had pretty extensive space traffic. Hanging in space a few kilometers away was an Imperial Relay Center, a spindly-looking space station that looked like it was made entirely of antennae and signal transmitters. And scattered here and there were massive disk-shaped stations that easily dwarfed the relay center. Even from her distant position, Jay could pick out the city-sized bulks of Star Destroyers — both complete and incomplete — docked at these giant orbital shipyards.

No one seemed to be taking any interest in her, so she forced herself to relax. Part of her had been expecting an Imperial ambush the moment she dropped out of hyperspace. She let out a long breath and took control of the ship after double-checking her restraints and opening a hailing comm to  _Void_  and  _Blood_   _Lily_.

"This is Captain Kol-... damn, I mean Moqena." She cursed herself silently for stumbling over her new name. "This is Captain Moqena, confirming hyperspace exit. You two there?"

" _Vhetin here_ ," came one response over the comm. " _I'm with you, Jay. How about you, Bri?_ "

" _Yeah, I'm here too_ ," said Brianna, sounding annoyed within the first few seconds of conversation. There was a pause, then the huntress’ tone softened. " _Wow. Would you look at that?_ "

As if on cue, Jay's ship fell into the massive triangular shadow of an Imperial-Class Star Destroyer. Jay's heart skipped a beat as the huge capital ship rumbled overhead, stretching out seemingly for miles ahead of her. Her ship was bathed in bluish-white light as its building-sized engines came into view. The ship continued its thunderous path before before turning ever-so-slowly to face the planet. A second later, a swarm of dropships and TIE fighters swarmed from its ventral docking bay and made a beeline for the planet. A massive troop transfer, clearly.

 _Yep_ , she thought as she let out a breath she hadn't known she was holding.  _This_   _is_   _definitely_   _enemy_   _territory._

" _Don't panic_ ," Vhetin murmured over the comm, as if he could read Jay's mind. " _They're not after us. Just fly casual and we should be fine._ "

"Copy that," she said, her voice betraying surprisingly little of the apprehension she felt.

She still didn't quite believe her partner’s estimate of the way Imperial Intelligence dealt with things. After what she'd gone through on Corulag, it seemed impossible that the Empire she knew would just set aside previous disputes to deal with a common enemy. It just sounded too...

 _Well,_ she thought, _too Mandalorian._

The comm sputtered again, this time an outgoing channel to the spindly Imperial Relay Center, the sole purpose of which was to transmit landing coordinates to incoming ships. Such a specialized station was necessary on a planet whose surface was 90% ocean.

" _Imperial Relay Command, this is freelance transport_ Blood Lily  _and two accomplices_ ," Brianna said, her voice surprisingly formal. Her cultured Coruscanti accent seemed stronger than usual. " _We are requesting landing clearance and coordinates to Saiton City in response to Imperial Bounty VX Twenty-Thirty-Two._ "

" _Roger that,_ Blood Lily," came the response. " _Transmitting now. Good hunting._ "

Jay shuddered at the thought that the planet below was probably crawling with hundreds of Imperials who would rather shoot her than allow a single blemish to be added to their record. They would probably recognize her from the bounty on her head and fire at her on sight.

 _Breathe, Jay._ She forced herself to calm down with a deep breath. _Six_   _months_   _ago_   _you_   _saw_   _these_   _people_   _as_   _family. Not_   _everyone_   _in_   _the_   _Empire is_   _evil. Remember, you_   _used_   _to_  be  _one_   _of_   _them._

Rather than dwell on such thoughts, she turned her ship toward the planet surface. Her ship jerked, then shot off into space after _Void_ and _Blood Lily._

" _The coordinates the IRC transmitted leads to a place called Saiton City in sector G-Eighty-Four, a few kilometers north of the equator,_ " Brianna said over the comm. " _Weather readout looks like they're on full hurricane alert till the end of next week. That should make things more interesting._ "

" _Hope you two packed raincoats_ ," Vhetin said, " _because-_ "

" _As I said before_ ," Brianna cut through suddenly, " _just follow my lead. I'm not having you two blowing this entire job and losing the reward._ "

" _Your absolute trust in us makes me all warm and fuzzy inside_ ," Vhetin replied, a definite tone of frustration in his voice. His girlfriend didn’t respond, instead opting to gun _Blood_   _Lily_ _’s_ engines and allow the boxy transport to shoot off toward the planet's surface.

Jay set the ship on manual pilot and dialed out a single comm to  _Void_. Vhetin responded after two hailing tones.

" _Got a problem?_ "

"What exactly happens now?" she asked him.

The familiar black-purple spearhead shape of  _Void_  swooped ahead of her as Brianna's ship made a beeline for high atmosphere. Jay gunned  _Vengeance's_  engines and rocketed after them. Her comm crackled with static for a few moments before Vhetin answered.

" _Simple_ ," the Mandalorian said, " _we check in the Imps, meet them down on the planet surface, and get to work._ "

"Right."

He must have heard the discomfort in her voice, because he added, " _Don't worry about the Imperials. I told you, they won't care what you did in the past as long as you're working for them now._ "

"I spent three months in a maximum-security prison for a crime I didn't commit," she reminded him. "I don't know if you've ever been in a max-sec prison, but it's not pretty. No visitors, no leaving your cell except for a half-hour of exercise while under armed guard, and stun cuffs around your ankles at all times. It's not exactly my fondest memory.”

Pointed silence from her partner.

“So,” she continued, “when you say the Empire will just look the other way while I go gallivanting around right under their nose with the guy who broke me out, I have a hard time believing you."

" _Just try to relax. And remember, your name is Jaimie Moqena now._ ”

She pushed her ship's engines to maximum output and shot forward, following the path of  _Blood_   _Lily_ 's bright red propulsion drives.

"Fine," she said, flexing her grip on the Y-shaped control yoke as she guided  _Vengeance_  down into Mon Cal's atmosphere. "But if I get arrested again, you're breaking me out again."

" _It's a deal. Just act natural._ "

As they crawled their way into atmosphere, there was an uneasy silence over the radio. Jay considered turning it off. But if she did and Vhetin or Brianna had something important to say, she'd miss it. So it stayed on, crackling with static.

After a few more tense moments, Jay decided to break the awkward quiet. She cleared her throat and said, "So... what exactly is up with you two?"

" _What do you mean?_ " Vhetin replied, his voice a little to tight to sound casual. Brianna's end of the comm was silent.

"Don't play dumb with me.” She frowned. “There's something going on between you two. Did you get in a fight or something?"

" _It's nothing_."

"It's important," she countered. "If you two can't work together, I'd be more successful going after this bounty on my own, and I'm the karking  _rookie_. After all, you told me yourself that hunters working together have to trust each other, even if it's only a slight trust."

" _We_ do  _trust each other_ ," Brianna finally said, sounding as if she were gritting her teeth.

"But you've obviously got something going on," Jay pressed. "If you're pissed about something, set it aside until all this is over."

" _Vhetin taught you well_ ," Brianna muttered. “ _You_ _’re as annoyingly observant as he is._ ”

"Stop dodging the question. Did you two have a fight or what?"

" _Yes_ ," Vhetin finally relented. There was more steel in his voice than she expected. " _We had a fight. But the juicy little details are none of your business._ "

She winced at the harsh tone. "Fair enough. Can you settle this till the job's done?"

" _I think we're mature enough to accomplish that_ ," Brianna muttered. " _Focus on your own problems._ "

Her end of the comm cut out with a hiss of static, and Jay shook her head in irritation. _I_   _think_   _I_   _know_   _now_   _why_   _she_   _likes_   _to_   _work_   _alone_ , she thought.  _She's_   _even_   _worse_   _than_   _Vhetin_   _when_   _it_   _comes_   _to_   _social skills._

After a moment of silence, her partner spoke again. " _Thanks for looking out for the team, Jay_."

"No prob-"

" _But my personal life is none of your business_ ," he continued tersely. " _And I'd appreciate it if you stayed out of it._ "

She opened her mouth to reply, then promptly shut it again. Much as she hated to admit it, the man had a point. She found a blush crawling up her cheeks, despite her best attempts to quell it.

 "Fine. I was just trying to help, but-"

" _I don't need your help._ "

His end of the comlink cut out as well, leaving Jay in silence.

~~~~~~~~

 **Landing**   **Pad**   **J-22, Saiton**   **City, Mon**   **Calamari**

Twenty minutes later, Vhetin was striding down the exit ramp of his ship, securing his helmet over his head and sealing his suit. He looked around the landing pad as driving rain slapped against his helmet's faceplate. It was odd seeing the rain droplets dribble down the T-visor of his helmet only millimeters from his face.

Suddenly a heated electrical charge ran across the visor, evaporating the rain and leaving his helmet clear for a few moments. In calm moments it seemed a waste of time and suit power, but in harried moments during combat, the ability to see clearly - even if only for a split second - was the difference between life and death. In addition, the current could be overcharged to send a debilitating electric charge coursing through whoever was unfortunate to lay unwanted hands on his helmet.

The floating landing pad was more than large enough to accommodate all three of the hunter's ships, though six-foot waves crashed over the edge of the pad and Vhetin felt the entire structure rise and fall with the powerful ocean swell beneath them.

Jay must have noticed they way his fists were clenched. She gestured to the tense set of his body. “You okay?”

He nodded, sucking in a short breath as the ground rose again beneath his feet. “I’m… not a fan of the ocean.”

“Hydrophobia?”

“Living your life in heavy battle armor will do that a man.”

Thunder cracked overhead as a blue-white fork of lightning flashed through the dark clouds. Vhetin glanced upward to watch it rip its way through the heavens as he stepped fully into the rain, then turned his attention to the six stormtroopers that had gathered to guard the hunters' welcoming party: an Imperial officer who stood at the end of the landing pad, hand clapped to his head to keep his cap from blowing away in the wind.

Vhetin moved towards the Imperial, noticing Brianna and Jay heading in that direction as well. Brianna was pointedly avoiding his gaze and Jay was holding her jacket shut against the buffeting wind, her long hair flying wild around her head. The officer nodded in relief as the three hunters stepped forward. He shook Brianna's hand energetically.

"I-I'm Lieutenant Floren," he called, squinting against the rain and ushering them toward the speeder bus that had no doubt brought him to the landing pad. He looked no older than eighteen and had a nervous air about him, as if he expected the three hunters to whip out their weapons and start blasting everything in sight. "Thank goodness you're here."

Brianna's nodded grimly and she shook his hand, shouting back, "I assume you're taking us to the man who posted this bounty?"

"That would be Governor Vonn, yes." The officer nodded as he pounded his fist on the side of the speeder bus for the pilot to open the door. Lightning struck the sea a few kilometers away, backlighting everything with an explosion of blinding white for the blink of an eye. The officer grimaced against the light, then let out a sigh of relief as the speeder's door slid open with a whine of hydraulics.

"Come in, come in," Floren said. "The governor has given me orders to bring you to him as soon as possible."

He stepped back as he allowed them to pile in, shaking excess water from his coat and wringing out his cap. When he saw Vhetin's bulky, armored form enter the bus, his eyes went wide.

"A _Mandalorian_?"

Vhetin returned the stare Floren gave him; the young man had probably never even  _seen_  a Mando before, let alone worked with one. All that most people knew of Mandalorians was the visage and reputation of Boba Fett. As a result, those same people were usually terrified of Mandos on sight alone.

Floren looked like one of those terrified people now, still wringing out his cap and glancing between the two unarmored huntresses that accompanied Vhetin. “Y-you didn’t inform the Governor that a Mandalorian would be accompanying you.”

Brianna glanced between Vhetin and the young Imperial. "He's one of the ones who responded to your bounty. You have a problem with that?"

"N-no," the officer stammered, his gaze unable to tear away from the menacing T-visor of Vhetin's helmet. He replaced his wrinkled cap on his head with a gulp. "Just... just no scalping, all right?"

 _Scalping?_  Vhetin thought, frowning at Brianna. She seemed to read his mind and share his confusion, but shook her head the slightest bit. _Just_   _play_   _the_   _big bad bounty_   _hunter_ , the motion translated.  _I'll_   _take_   _care_   _of_   _the_   _rest_.

So he looked back to the officer and growled, "As long as no one pisses me off. If they do, I won't make any promises."

The officer paled, but nodded. Jay glanced at her partner, then back to the officer. As Floren moved forward to have a word with the speeder pilot, she murmured, "Please don't tell me that you actually used to scalp people."

"Of course not," he whispered back. "Just play along. A little fear can go a long way."

Floren returned, wringing his empty hands in place of his cap as he glanced between the three. Vhetin activated his helmet's video pickup, recording a quick image of the man for later reference. If Sazh Kisaragi was right, then Uruc had Imperial help to smuggle her weapons and Warriors past the cargo supervisors. The hunters would do well to remain cautious of any Imperial they came across.

Floren was young, of medium height and build, with short black hair, a long nose, and pale blue eyes that darted around nervously. As he studied the man, he was reminded of several species of obnoxious Keldabe rodents. Still, he sensed no outward animosity from him. Even if he was a potential threat, it didn't look like he'd be much of a problem if things got violent.

Brianna pulled her wet hair back over her shoulders, readjusting her tight braid. "So. What's the situation in Saiton?"

Floren shrugged. Vhetin didn’t much appreciate the way his eyes darted over Brianna’s body as she stretched to shift her gear. He couldn’t blame the man too much, though; the huntress’ unconventional armor was cut to expose quite a bit of toned skin along her chest, arms, and stomach. It was supposed to draw attention to her body and away from her weapons — a useful advantage when successful. Most males in their profession weren’t exactly gentlemen, and Brianna had learned to exploit their lust for the weakness it truly was. Most barely had the time to begin oogling her before they were on the ground with her knee in their back.

Still, Vhetin would have been more comfortable if she had zipped up her flak jacket just a half-inch more; they weren’t even in hostile territory yet, and there was rarely reason to show _that_ much cleavage.

"T-they don't tell me much,” Floren was stuttering, “and the whole business with Uruc has everyone on edge. All I know is that you three are the first hunters to respond to the bounty.”

He licked his thin lips, eyes darting between the assembled hunters. “Do… do you think you can bring her in?"

Vhetin and Jay glanced at each other. Kassh had been tough to bring down, but he'd just been a gangster. An actual terrorist was something else entirely. Vhetin had done some counter-terrorism ops while serving with the Empire, but had taken onlya  few freelance bounties on terrorist leaders during his seven-year profession. Those jobs had been among the tougher missions of his career, but it was nothing he couldn't handle with reinforcements at his back.

 _I've_   _been_   _in_   _this_   _business_   _since_   _I_   _was_   _thirteen_   _years_   _old,_ he thought.  _Gangsters, drug_   _dealers, terrorists, they all_   _have_   _weaknesses. Never found a single target who didn_ _’t go down when you put enough bolts in them._

Brianna looked disinterested in Floren’s question. "As long as your payment comes through in the end, we'll bring her in."

Floren nodded, though he looked only slightly comforted. Vhetin folded his arms across his chest, a motion which always seemed to double his size, and said, "What about this governor?"

"Governor Vonn?" Floren looked confused. "What about him?”

“I like to know my employers. Tell me about him.”

“He's... he's okay, I guess. He doesn't overpressure the troops under his command, and-"

"Is there any chance he's in league with Uruc?"

" _Vonn_? Not a chance," Floren chuckled nervously. "He's… old-fashioned. He used to serve in the Republic Navy. Doesn't like doing business with anyone who reminds him of Separatists."

 _Good. Then_   _he's_   _one_   _Imperial_   _we_   _can_   _trust_ , Vhetin thought, realizing how ridiculous that sounded even as he thought it.  He wasn't about to  _trust_  any Imperial, lest he make the same mistakes that had cost him dearly time and again in the past. But at least this man wasn't the type to ally himself with Uruc. And he was the one who had posted the bounty in the first place. Not exactly what one would expect from an accomplice.

Floren headed back up to the cockpit of the speeder bus, squeezing past Vhetin's armored form with another nervous smile. The door slid shut behind the young officer, leaving the hunters blissfully free of Imperial eyes and ears. Vhetin turned to Brianna with a glare that was hidden by his helmet.

"' _Scalping_?'" he echoed. "What kind of bounty hunter did you tell them I was?"

Brianna scowled at him. "Don't get your durasteel underbritches in a twist, Stripes. I didn't tell him anything."

Jay nodded as she wrung rainwater from her hair and said, "Yeah, um... the general view of Mandalorians is that they're kind of... savage. Some of you  _do_  wear scalps as trophies."

"Yeah, but not  _me_ ," he muttered. He shook his head with a muttered string of _Mando_ _’a_ curses. "Never mind. You told us to follow your lead, Bri, so what do you have in mind?"

The huntress rubbed her chin. "Well, we can't do anything until this rain lets up. Most of the businesses around the city will be shut up from the hurricane, and there will be evacuation plans throughout the city. They’ll slow our investigation down even more than usual."

“We can’t wait until the hurricane passes,” Vhetin pointed out. “We don’t have that kind of time.”

"And what about your contact?" Jay asked. "The guy whose name you refuse to give us?"

"My contact won't leave the city for love or money, but if he gets, ah… _customers_ in the middle of a storm like this, he's going to make a run for it."

"Who is this guy?" Jay asked. "He doesn't sound all that trustworthy."

Brianna shot her a smirk. "Patience, Rookie. You'll know soon enough."

"Why do I get the feeling you're hiding something?"

Brianna unconsciously copied Vhetin’s current expression, narrowing her brown eyes and icily replying, "Well, you would be the expert on hiding things, wouldn't you Cin?"

Jay raised an eyebrow, but stayed silent. Vhetin just stared at Brianna, steadily meeting her gaze.

One of the things Vhetin liked most about his helmet was its durability in a stare-down. No one - not even someone as tough as Bri - could hold out against the expressionless gaze of a Mandalorian battle helmet. Such a stare could break even the strongest opponent. And sure enough she looked away, ran a hand through her wet hair, and sighed, "Anyway... we need to link up with this Governor Vonn, maybe check out Uruc's newest hit. See if we can't find out what the bloody hell is going on."

"Jay and I will talk to the Governor,” Vhetin said with ice in his voice. “You can check out Uruc's latest crime scene. We'll update you if we find anything more."

They all lapsed into a tense silence. Vhetin turned to stare out the speeder's viewports, watching as dark buildings flashed by and raindrops hit the transparisteel windows like bullets. Lightning struck somewhere inside the city, dancing along the roof of a building and flickering there for a moment before fading away into the echoing rumble of thunder.

Somewhere out there, in the middle of this mess, was Jolee Uruc. She had an entire terrorist group at her disposal while the city’s evacuation gave her that much more cover to conduct their business. And they were racing against more than just time; the hurricane would severely damage this city when it hit. If it was powerful enough it could even damage the repulsors that kept the city afloat, sending the entire metropolis sinking into the depths of the Mon Cal ocean.

Vhetin sighed and shook his head.

 _Charming_.


	5. Investigating the Attack

Brianna parted ways with the other hunters after a short ride, transferring from the speeder headed for the Imperial Security Bureau to another bound for what was left of Garrison Command. She left with barely a word, casting a badly-concealed glare in Vhetin's direction before stepping into the rain and following Lieutenant Floren to the other bus.

Jay felt genuinely sorry for interfering with the two earlier. She may be Vhetin's partner, but in her attempt to get the two to set aside their quarrel, she had severely overstepped her bounds. It wasn't her business to pry into anyone else's life, and especially not two bounty hunters as lethal as Vhetin and Brianna.

Still, she had to admit, it was interesting to see what kind of relationship the two shared after all the  _Oyu'baat_  rumors she'd heard over the months. Apparently they were a fairly popular gossip topic among off-duty Mando bounty hunters. Both were well-known and well-respected hunters among the Keldabe crowd and apparently such esteem had other locals conversing about more than just their latest contract.

To Jay's eyes, their relationship was hardly a relationship at all. She saw none of the typical behavior of lovers: no meaningful gazes, no holding hands, no public shows of affection at all. It was almost as if they refused to allow themselves to see the other that way. Perhaps it was just a Mandalorian thing?

 _Then_   _again,_  she thought as she watched dark buildings race by in the view of the waterlogged window,  _they_   _did_   _just_   _have_   _a_   _fight. They_   _must_   _be pretty_   _pissed_   _at_   _each_   _other._

But if that was the case, why did Brianna demand to accompany them? Why did she all but barge in and take command of the entire contract?

It was another half-hour of waiting as the speeder bus fell into congested skylanes packed with civilian and emergency vehicles alike. A trio of TIE fighters roared overhead, accompanying the sleek lines of troop dropships racing off toward the horizon. A cadre of bulky, boxy civilian transports followed close behind like a pack of hounds trailing after their masters.

“A lot of activity in the city,” she noted. “They must be pretty scared of this hurricane.”

“A home-grown Mon Calamari special,” Vhetin said. He was standing behind her, consulting a handheld datapad. “From what I read, it’s a low-level Category Five: winds around 200 kilometers per hour.”

She let out a low whistle. “Don’t these floating cities have some kind of shields made just for this sort of thing? A giant, city-wide deflector dome?”

“Usually,” her partner agreed. The speeder bus jostled beneath their feet, forcing him to grab an overhead stabilization bar. “But the winds and the waves together are what’s worrying people. If they manage to overpower the shields, this entire city could go under.”

“Is that common?”

He nodded, scrolling through the report on his datapad. “Local news reports that a city about this size was hit last year. The city broke apart and sank within four hours of the hurricane making landfall.”

He shrugged. “They evacuated most of the population beforehand, so the casualties weren’t as severe as they could have been.”

“How many died?”

“Two thousand stubborn locals who refused to leave. But the evacuations saved almost five hundred thousand.”

Another low whistle. “And why are we here again?”

“A paycheck,” he replied evenly. “The eternal crusade of the bounty hunter.”

“Right.” She rolled her eyes.

“So long as we find our target and get out of here before the storm hits, we’ll be fine.”

Jay was about to say more when she was interrupted by the bus pilot. The man glanced over his shoulder at the two hunters and called, "Imperial Security Bureau, coming up on your left. Get ready to get rained on again, people."

The bus pulled out of the congested skylanes and descended to ground level with a warbling groan of its engines. Vhetin nodded and thanked the pilot as the speeder set down on a nearby landing pad. He pushed open the door and stood aside to give Jay room to step past him.

"Ladies first," he said, jerking his head to the downpour outside.

She shot him a good-natured glare, then zipped up her jacket and stepped out into the rain. He was right behind her as she made her way through the storm to the front entrance of the Imperial Security Bureau: a large, multi-towered building that seemed more like a high-tech castle than an Imperial command base. The front doors were little more than a smear against the dark rain around her, lit from within by warm-looking yellow lighting. A line of white-clad stormtroopers stood guard outside, unflinching and seemingly unperturbed in the heinous weather. Even as lightning flashed down from the heavens and struck the ground not a hundred meters away, the pristine white troops didn’t even flinch.

Jay began to drift off course, squinting and blind in the rain. Vhetin, somehow able to see through the pouring rain, took her arm and led her toward the building. They approached the front entrance after far too long in the maelstrom, and Jay saw there was someone to greet them. A very _official-_ looking someone.

He stood just within the door, out of the grasp of the weather outside. An elderly man, clad in a neatly-pressed black Imperial uniform. His white hair was combed to one side and his short white mustache showed signs of equal care and tending. He was obviously a man who took appearances very seriously. He clasped his hands behind his back and bounced on the balls of his feet impatiently as he waited for them to draw closer. As they stepped up to the front doors of Command, thankfully shielded from the rain by a durasteel awning, he nodded in greeting and ushered them inside.

"Greetings. I'm Governor Vonn," he said with palpable relief in his voice. He clasped Vhetin's hand and shook it. "I'm so glad you're here."

Jay shook rain droplets off her new armorleather coat, but said nothing as they stepped through the doors to Imperial Command. She did not, however, overlook the fact that he had pointedly _not_ shaken her hand. She wasn’t surprised. Of the two, Vhetin always looked the part of the experienced hunter and as such was given most of the attention. Her lips pursed in irritation, but she knew better than to confront their employer over such a slight.

The room they entered next was huge, with plush purple carpeting and draperies hung on the walls proudly displaying the iconic Imperial Wheel. Huge silver-polished durasteel columns stretched high above her head, anchoring into the ceiling with the smooth, organic-looking architecture the galaxy had come to expect from Mon Calamari craftsmen. But that wasn't what drew her gaze; her heart was pounding in her chest as they walked past four assembled rows of stormtroopers on each side of the hall, all standing at attention for the Governor. There had to be at least fifty of them, all assembled to greet their Governor and his guests.

 _Calm_   _down_ , she thought to herself.  _If_   _they_   _were_   _going_   _to_   _shoot_   _you, they_   _would_   _have_   _done_   _it_   _by_   _now._

For a moment, she was confused as to why such a prestigious assembly would be arranged for simple bounty hunters. According to her partner, most Imperials didn’t want to be seen with their kind. To Imperial eyes, mercenaries and hunters were little better than scum.

But then she saw the gray-uniformed officers prowling along the lines of troops and she quickly realized the truth: the Imps were pulling out of the city as well. This wasn’t a greeting assembly for some great dignitary, but a simple roll call. They were getting ready to abandon the city with all the rest.

 _The hurricane must be worse than Vhetin let on_ , she thought. _I_ _’ve never seen the Empire scrambling to run away._

Vhetin, meanwhile, fell in step next to the Governor, clearly ignoring the troops assembled around them. "Good to meet you, Governer. I’m Cin Vhetin and this is my partner, Jay Moqena. I wish I could say I was glad to be here, but..."

"Ah, yes," Vonn said with a cheerless smile. "Saiton City is usually a jewel on the ever-ocean of Mon Calamari. Tourists flock from all corners of the galaxy to bask in the beauty of our floating island, and I won't lie and say it's not a large part of our income here. But with this hurricane, things are a tad hectic. The local Mon Cal population is helping our evacuation, but Imperials are not allowed to set foot in their underwater cities. We’re having to relocate the refugees to the orbital stations until the storm passes."

"Interesting. So tell me what you know about Jolee Uruc," Vhetin said, cutting straight to the point.

A look of distaste crossed the Governor’s lined face at the name. "Of course, of course. But... we must wait until we are in a more secure area. As I’m sure you’ve heard, that dreadful woman is getting Imperial information somehow. I believe one of my men is to blame."

"You do realize that your leak is probably nothing more than a HoloNet tap into your systems?" Vhetin said. "You may not even have a spy."

Jay looked at the ranks of stormtroopers with newfound suspicion. Who knew what face was hiding behind those helmets? But Vhetin didn't seem disturbed by the thought of a terrorist mole inside the garrison, so she turned her attention back to the conversation at hand. She sped up her pace and stepped up next to her partner.

"Why did you post a bounty on Uruc's head in the first place?" Vhetin inquired. “This seems a job for Imperial Intelligence agents. Strange that they kicked it to the private sector.”

"She led a raid on the Garrison Command two weeks ago," the Governor replied. "She killed everyone inside and stole... well, we still don't know what she was doing there, but she stole  _something_."

"You guys sure give a glowing endorsement to Imperial investigative protocol," Jay muttered. "Two weeks and you still have no clue what she was doing in your headquarters?"

"Jay," Vhetin said her, his voice sharp. There was an unspoken warning in his tone and she quickly backed down. Unfortunately, it was too late to pass Vonn’s notice.

"Yes, I am aware you two have little love for the Empire," the old man said with a sigh. At Vhetin's questioning stare, he said, "Oh, I know exactly who you two are. Cin Vhetin and Jay Moqena, one of you a former member of the ICF task force and the other a decorated pilot-turned-mercenary."

Jay's heart almost stopped. He was a little too well-informed for her tastes, even if he only seemed familiar with her cover identity. But before she could panic too much, Vonn continued, "Don't panic. I simply like to know who I’m dealing with before every I meet them. I'm old fashioned that way. The enemy of my enemy and all that..."

Jay glanced at Vhetin, reminded of their conversation back in Keldabe. But she tried to at least meet the Imperial halfway and act polite, even if she felt dirty from just shaking the man's hand. He was just an old man, after all.

They walked in silence for a few long minutes, through winding halls bustling with Imperial personnel. Everyone was indeed scrambling in the face of the approaching hurricane. Jay almost lost her partner in the hustle on several occasions, forced to push and elbow her way through the chaos.

Just when she was getting irritated, they finally stepped into an office at the end of the hall that was blissfully free of other people. A large durasteel blast door slid shut over the entrance after they crossed the threshold, booming shut and locking with several hefty-sounding clanks. Jay glanced over her shoulder at the huge door, then fixed Vonn with a curious gaze, raising an eyebrow.

"Those are some pretty impressive defenses," she said. "Expecting company?"

Vonn sighed as he settled himself behind his durasteel desk, which was littered with datapads and sheets of flimsi. "Precautionary measures. With Uruc on the loose out there, we cannot take any chances."

Vhetin folded his arms across his chest. "And what have you found out about her? Does I.I. have a character profile?"

Vonn shrugged. "I barely know anything. Cursory investigation claims she was born on Jabiim a decade or so before the Clone Wars. Lived there during the fighting between the Republic and the Separatists."

"That was some nasty turf."

"Indeed.” Vonn nodded with a somber air. “During the Wars, she served with the Jabiimi Resistance Movement, opposing Republic occupation and eventually becoming the leader of one of their underworld cells. She was both directly and indirectly responsible for the deaths of over one thousand clone trooper units. When the New Order rose, she handed control of the JRM to a lesser member who was soon after assassinated by Imperial Commandos.”

“She left her homeworld?” Vhetin’s voice carried a frown. “Why?”

"We believe she came to Mon Calamari, intent on destroying the Empire a little bit at a time,” Vonn supplied. “This planet is a symbol to the galaxy, a symbol that shows Imperial order is not a simple fiction. With the Mon Cal shipyards serving our ends, Imperial rule can be spread to all corners of the galaxy. Our presence here is a linchpin ensuring stability and security for countless other worlds.”

Jay felt compelled to point out that the Governor’s _Imperial order_ was built on the backs of equally countless Mon Cal slaves, subjugated after a bloody and violent uprising that cost many, many lives. There were still pockets of resistance where the aquatic Mon Calamari traded bloody battles with the planet’s other dominant, pro-Imperial race, the Quarren.

But she knew confronting Governor Vonn with such accusations would not ingratiate herself with her employer. It would irritate her ever-professional partner even more. So, despite her rebellious tongue aching to loose itself on the unsuspecting Imperial, she kept quiet. For the moment.

Vonn, meanwhile, was still talking.

“She started out as a simple murderer,” he was saying. “Massacring several Mon Cal and Quarren families and an Imperial officer here or there. She caused a small civilian war between two powerful Imperial families in the city, playing on the tensions that already existed between the two.”

“The work of a thug,” Vhetin pointed out. “Not a terrorist.”

“She was working up to that,” Vonn assured him. “She was using these small hits to make a name for herself. To gain the attention and appreciation of other unsavory characters. Once her position in the underworld pecking order was secure, she began building up her own organization: the Thirteen Warriors. They are a small group, but effective. "

He pulled a thick folder of flimsiplast from a drawer and passed it to Vhetin. The Mandalorian took it and instantly began thumbing through it. Jay knew from previous experience that he wasn’t actually reading the files. Rather, he was recording each page with his helmet-mounted cameras, saving them for later perusal at his leisure.

"Her first attack was on a bacta-processing plant for the local clinic almost a year and a half ago," Vonn said as Vhetin continued his perusal of the files. "The loss caused over thirty deaths, then a hundred more when the medcenters began running low on supplies. From then, her attacks only grew larger and more devastating with each month that passed. Now we don't even know where to start looking, and her apparent mole within the local forces has only made matters worse."

Vhetin nodded and passed the file to Jay. "She sounds like quite the handful. Do you have any tactical information? Have you identified any of her followers? One of them might provide us with information."

"Unfortunately not," Vonn said with a sympathetic look. "As I've said before, we are at a loss to combat her organization. We simply do not have the resources to track her down, hence the reason I placed a bounty upon her head."

Vhetin nodded. "I understand. And you're sure there's nothing else you can tell us?"

"No. But I must ask: what do you wish us to do while you are here?"

"Absolutely nothing," Jay said, tucking Uruc's file under her arm. "If Uruc suspects we're here, she'll disappear before you can bat an eyelash."

Vhetin nodded in agreement and Vonn sighed, nodding and running a hand through his neatly-arranged white hair. "As you wish."

“Thank you for the meeting, Governor.” Vhetin bowed stiffly, only at the shoulders. It was a sign of respect, but rigid enough to not be _too_ respectful. "You'll be hearing from us again."

Vhetin nodded to Jay and subtly gestured to the heavy blast doors now rumbling open to allow them outside. They both turned to leave, and Jay pointedly did not offer the Governor any sign of respectful farewell. He had not, after all, deigned to shake her hand. She would not grant him such respect either.

"Oh!" Vonn called after them just as they crossed over the threshold. The hunters paused and Vhetin half-turned back to the elderly man, still seated at his desk.

"I didn't know whether I should offer,” Vonn said, “but there is a rather large banquet taking place in the city tomorrow. One last gathering before the evacuation takes everyone from the city. I wonder if you would attend? For your own pleasure or to help with the security forces, either would be fine."

Vhetin glanced at Jay, clearly about to turn down the Governor’s invitation. She didn’t blame him; they were bounty hunters, not private security. But she surprised them both when she cut over her partner and said, "We'll be there."

Vonn blinked, as if he himself hadn’t thought they would agree. Then he smiled and bowed — like Vhetin, only at the neck.

“You honor me, hunters,” he said. “I thank you, and will await your presence.”

Then they left the room, the huge durasteel door booming shut behind them and cutting Governor Vonn from their view. As they headed back down to the cavernous central hall of the building, past throngs of busy Imperials and their many assistants, Vhetin glanced at Jay with a slight tilt of his angular helmet.

"And why, exactly do you want to go to a fancy Imperial banquet?"

"Think about it," she said, thumbing through the file Vonn had given them and perusing its contents. None of it was pretty. "Uruc has been hiding out for almost two weeks with no attacks. She and her people must be getting restless, ready for another big hit. And a big fancy dinner with a bunch of Imperials is just the thing to pique her interest. It's a viable target."

"So if she attacks," Vhetin said, "we'll be there to stop her. Not a bad idea."

"Do you think she'll fall for it? From what this file says, she's nothing like Kassh."

He shrugged. "She may not. But our chances are good, and it's too big a target for us  _not_  to consider."

"But that might be what she wants," Jay pointed out. "She might just use attention on the banquet as a distraction to stage some other attack."

He snorted. "Don't overthink the criminal mind, Jay. People like Uruc aren't complicated. When they want something, they'll take it as soon as they can."

"And what does Uruc want?" Jay asked, looking back down at the file. "These attacks seem pretty random."

"That," Vhetin said, "is the first thing we need to find out."

~~~~~~~~

 **Speeder**   **bus**   **en**   **route**   **to**   **Imperial**   **Garrison**   **Command**

Brianna gripped the handrail above her head as she and Lieutenant Floren headed for the ruins of the IGC. Her gaze was steady as she stared out the viewport of the borrowed speeder bus, watching the city outside. The rain had finally starting to let up and she could see the first patches of blue sky high above, though there were more dark clouds on the horizon. These were just the first storms, the shock troops that heralded the great hurricane bearing down on them all.

Outwardly, she was sure she appeared calm, cool, and collected. Her training had taught her how to remain professional even in the most intense situations. Yet as steady and calm as her appearance may have looked, she was in turmoil within. Her mind was a swirling maelstrom of anger, indignation, and cold disappointment. And all her thoughts returned to Cin kriffing Vhetin.

She hadn’t meant to accompany him on this hunt. If she could have convinced him to pass the contract to her, to allow her to pursue this investigation alone, she would have. But she knew Cin, and that meant she knew he would not back out on a contract he had already pledged to fulfill.

So here she was, tagging along on a dangerous hunt with a man she desperately wanted to avoid. The irony of it roiled in her gut, stoking a quite multifaceted kind of anger. She was angry about their argument, of course, angry that these damned contracts were more important to him than she was. But she was also angry at herself, unable to convince herself she was _worth_ more than these contracts. Was it something she did? Something she _didn_ _’t_ do? What was it that made him turn away from time spent with her in favor of time spent out here, on rain-lashed Mon Calamari in search of violent and treacherous terrorists?

It was clear the man was miserable, both on and off the battlefield. He’d perked up a little in recent months, obviously invigorated by his training with Jay. But that dark cloud had slowly begun to creep back in and smother him like before. She was losing him to that cloud, like she’d done so many times in the past.

And then there was _that_ anger, too. She was angry with herself for not understanding his pain, angry with him for not opening up and _allowing_  her to understand, angry that the relationship she so treasured was crumbling around her. She let out a quiet sigh, only a fraction of the frustration she truly felt. Why wouldn't Cin let her in? Why wouldn't he allow anyone to get close to him? She would help if she could, but he very clearly would not or could not allow her such intimacy. What was he afraid of?

And that was what she was the most angry about. She was his girlfriend, the one person he claimed to trust above all others. And yet there were  _still_  so many questions about him, all while the Big Question still remained, the one she asked herself every time she looked at him whether it was through his helmet's T-visor or straight in the eyes.

Who was he?

She shook her head and thought,  _Damn_   _him. He_   _hides_   _himself_   _away behind that helmet, cowering_   _behind_   _his_   _image_   _as_   _the_   _strong-but-silent_   _warrior. He refuses_   _to_   _let_   _anyone_   _help_   _him, to_   _let_   _anyone_   _know_   _the_   _truth, then complains that he_ _’s alone._

With effort she convinced herself to back down, though it was difficult to reign in such righteous indignation. 

 _That's_   _not_   _fair. If_   _there_   _were_   _any_   _answers, he'd_   _tell_   _me._

 _Wouldn't_   _he?_

She forced herself to focus. Her problems with Cin could wait until later. Right now, she had a job to do. If she was distracted while looking for someone as dangerous as Jolee Uruc, she was going to end up dead. If she wished to continue tearing herself apart over such trivial problems as romantic relationships, she needed to keep on her toes here and now.

Just thinking of Uruc sent a shiver of rage down her spine. Oh yes, just like Cin _had his reasons_ for hiding his past, she had her own reasons for tagging along on this bounty. It didn’t escape her notice that she was forcing herself into a double-standard where  _her_  secrets were permissible while Cin's were offensive. But maybe he needed a taste of his own medicine for once.

The bus swerved into another skylane, making the floor shift dangerously beneath them. Lieutenant Floren stumbled slightly, hand instinctively snatching his hat and pinning it to his head. Brianna just braced her legs, bent her knees, and didn't move an inch.

"So..." Floren murmured nervously. He was wringing his cap between his hands again, a habit of his that Brianna found rather irritating. He swallowed and said, "Um... so you're a bounty hunter?"

She nodded slowly, her gaze not moving from the view of the outside. "Yes."

"Hm... and how... how much does that pay?"

"Enough."

Floren bit at his thin lip, seeming to consider whether or not to speak more. He opened his mouth, closed it again, then frowned and finally said, "Have you killed people before?"

She glanced at him, then away. "Yes."

"How many?"

"Enough."

"Oh. Right.” He gulped. “Okay."

The speeder swerved into another skylane, then swooped toward the ground and rested in on a landing pad near the edge of the city. There was a loud hiss of escaping coolant gas as the speeder settled.

"Here we are,” the pilot called to them. “What's left of the IGC. Good thing the rain's letting up, otherwise you guys wouldn't be able to see anything."

"Thank you, pilot," Floren called as he pushed open the door to the outside and stood aside to allow Brianna out. She stepped out onto the ground below, her heavy boots splashing in small puddles of rainwater as she stared around the area.

The bus had dropped them in what looked like a plaza or square, all shiny gray and white durasteel. There was a small park nearby, with trees stripped of leaves by the earlier storm. The entire plaza looked deserted, but she was hardly surprised at that. The nearby residents most likely evacuated due to the double threat of the earlier attack and the incoming hurricane.

Her gaze was drawn to the still-smoldering ruin of a building just ahead of her. Once it could have been three stories. Now it could barely boast one. There was holographic crime scene tape stretching around the area, warning unauthorized personnel to stay out, but Brianna paid it no heed as she stepped through and approached the bombed-out ruin of the Imperial Garrison Command.

It wasn't a pretty sight. There were holographic representations of charred and broken bodies littered about the area, flickering as sporadic droplets of rain fell through them. The puddles of water were dirty and black with ash and mixed into a disgusting sludge beneath Brianna's boots.

The building itself was a wreck. The walls had collapsed, leaving little more than twisted durasteel girders and a few clinging chunks of duracrete. The doors had been blown out of their housing and now sat embedded a meter deep into a nearby building.

Brianna stopped by a toppled wall blown outward by the blast of whatever bomb Uruc had planted within the building. She knelt and brushed her fingertips along the burnt material, closing her eyes and imagining the size of the explosion that had ripped this place apart.

 _High-grade_   _Tolorum_   _explosives, at_   _least_ , she thought.  _Maybe_   _even_   _a_   _couple_   _baradium_   _bricks_   _strapped_   _together_.  _Nothing_   _irradiated, though, otherwise_   _the_   _Imps_   _would_   _have_   _hazmat_   _teams_   _all_   _over_   _this_   _place._

She was aware of Lieutenant Floren following close behind her, hovering nervously at her shoulder and obviously trying to figure out what she was thinking. She turned to him and gestured to the ruins.

"When did this happen?"

"Two weeks ago," Floren replied instantly. "Oh-nine-hundred hours Galactic Standard Time."

Brianna nodded as she turned back to the rubble at her feet. She rubbed some ash between her fingers, tasted some, then quickly spat it back out again. The bitter tinge of Tolorum dust was evident, even through the dull and earthy taste of burnt duracrete.

"Tell me about the hit," she said, surveying the wreckage. She rested her hands on her thighs, eyes raking across the bombed-out scenery. It didn’t look like any evidence would have survived the blast. Even the durasteel skeleton of the building was warped and melted into a twisted shell of destruction.

"Um... I'm not sure that's necessary," Floren stammered. "There is ample security footage that-"

"Tell me."

"Y-yes ma'am," the lieutenant obliged. "The... the attack started at oh-nine-hundred Galactic Standard Time-"

"You said that already," Brianna told him, running her hand across another blasted piece of duracrete. The burnt ridges on the stone-like substance meant that the explosion wasn't a professional job. A crude IED if she had to hazard a guess. It had been powerful, but a true Tolorum detonation would have reduced most of this place to ash.

"Uruc and her Warriors approached from an unidentified starship and entered the building via the southern entrance. They didn’t spend long hiding. They quickly revealed themselves and took over twenty hostages."

She frowned. "Why wasn't the local law enforcement informed of the attack?"

"The Warriors were careful to keep their faces hidden from the cameras. By the time law enforcement officers were notified, it was too late."

"Odd," Brianna murmured, rising from her knees and brushing the ash from her gloves, "considering that everyone knows who Uruc is already."

"No one was identified except her. She was the only one who didn't wear a mask."

"And after that?"

"Nothing," Floren reported. "One of the first things they did was cut the holorecorders. We don't know what they were doing there, and as you can see..."

He gestured to the ruins of the IGC. "Well, we have yet to discover what they sought to accomplish. The building exploded from within soon after they left, killing all the hostages. Evidence has since been difficult to come by."

"Convenient. Were there any witnesses that survived the attack?" she asked the Imperial. She moved forward a few steps and knelt again near a shattered chunk of marble from the Garrison Command's floor. Dried, burnt blood stained the once-pristine stone, warped and smeared by a massive footprint.

As Floren answered, "No, ma'am," she began assembling all the pieces of marble that she could find. She'd always been good a puzzles, always had a knack for piecing together things that had been broken. It wasn’t long before she had reassembled all the shattered panel she could manage and had a complete footprint sitting before her. It wasn't a boot, she could be sure of it, but exactly what kind of print it was she couldn't tell yet.

She pulled a pencil-thin recorder from her belt and snapped a quick image of the marble panel, then tucked the recorder behind her ear and projected the image up into the air ahead of her.

"What are you doing?" Floren stepped up next to her. She glanced at the nervous-looking officer, then turned back to her work. Using her hands as an interface, she turned and twisted the holographic image in mid-air, spinning it until it faced her and tracing the edges of the print to simulate likely missing patterns. She clenched her fists and contracted the image to eliminate most of the cracks in the stone. With a sweep of one hand, she erased the rest and was left with an unaltered, unbroken image of the marble and the footprint on it.

She squinted at the hologram with a concerned frown. Then she shook her head and grunted, "Well… that's not good."

"What?" Floren squeaked, staring at the hologram. "What is that?"

"That," she said, saving the image and deactivating the recorder, "is a Wookiee footprint."

She tucked the recorder back onto her belt and replaced it with her hands-free comlink. She quickly dialed out a hailing code. Floren was left to occupy himself by glancing between the ruins of the IGC and the huntress.

" _Bri_ ," Vhetin answered after two beeps, " _tell me you have good news._ "

She shook her head as she strode closer to the burned-out shell of the building. "Not as such. I'm down here at the Imperial Garrison Command. Not much evidence, but I've got a clear Wookiee footprint. So either the Wookiee was one of the patrons at the time of the hit—"

" _I doubt it_ ," Vhetin said. " _There aren't many of them on Mon Cal. They prefer trees, not oceans._ "

"—or the furball is one of Uruc's Warriors."

" _Okay_ ," he breathed. " _That's not good. But at least we have a slight idea what we're up against. Anything else?_ "

Brianna paused near another cracked and broken chunk of marble from the floor. She picked it up and hefted it in her hand for a moment. "Yes. I'm bringing a blasted part of the floor back with me. Do you think you could... you know?"

There was a long pause from Vhetin, then he said, " _I'll see what I can do._ "

“Good. See you soon. Bellan out.” She nodded and signed off as she tucked the chunk of marble into the pack on her left hip.

"You can't do that!" Floren was quick to protest. "You can't take evidence from an active crime-"

"I don't think anyone will miss a fist-sized chunk of rubble," she interrupted. "And this might just be the key to tracking Uruc down. Don't complain."

The lieutenant seemed to debate with himself over the matter for some time. He opened his mouth, closed it again. Then he slowly sighed and relented. "All right," he said. "Just don't tell anyone. If my superiors knew I was letting you—"

The roar of a shuttle passing overhead made him pause and the young lieutenant looked up into the cloudy sky. Brianna looked up only when she heard Floren curse.

"Blast," he murmured. "Now I'm going to get it."

She straightened, brushing her hands off as she watched a typical long-winged Imperial shuttle fly in low over the plaza and swoop around for a landing. She narrowed her eyes at the sight and rested her hands on her hips. "Friend of yours?"

"Commander Pelano," Floren sighed as the shuttle cruised down to the landing pad some meters away, its wings folding up from their inverted-Y flight mode. The landing ramp hit the ground with a resounding metallic  _thud_ and a black-uniformed Imperial officer almost instantly came storming down into the cold and humid air. He looked around for a moment, taking in the destruction, then spotted the two and headed for them, clearly angry. His face was red and his fists were clenched as he stormed across the plaza.

"What is the meaning of this?" he snapped as he approached.

Brianna folded her arms and raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Is there a problem?"

"This is a restricted area!" the officer snapped. "Civilians are not allowed within a hundred meters of this place, by order of Governor Vonn himself!"

He turned to Floren and leveled an accusatory finger at the young man’s chest. "And  _you,_  Lieutenant! Explain why you are letting a civilian contaminate an active crime scene!"

Brianna examined this new Imperial. He was tall and athletically built, with dark red hair and a neatly-trimmed mustache and beard. He was indeed a commander if the badge on his chest was any indication. His uniform was pressed till the creases looked almost as sharp as razor blades, though the pristine condition of the suit was currently being ruined by the fat raindrops still falling lazily from the sky.

He was doing his best to appear tall and menacing, puffing out his chest and looking down his nose at the two standing before him. She wasn't impressed. She could take him if push came to shove.

“Answer me, Lieutenant!”

"This... this civilian is a bounty hunter," Floren stammered. "She's here to bring Uruc to justice."

That got him to pause. He stood silent for a few moments, as if lost for words. Then he turned to Brianna and eyed her just as she had observed him moments before. His gaze lingered a little too long for her to think he was just sizing up the heavy pistols on her belt, but she ignored the stare; it was half the reason she dressed the way she did after all. So long as her enemies kept their eyes on her chest and away from her guns, she was a happy huntress.

“"Well...” He scowled at her with gritted teeth and narrowed eyes. “It seems my apologies are warranted, ma'am. I did not mean-"

She brushed past him, heading back for the waiting speeder bus. "Save it. I've got a job to do."

She thought that would be the end of it all, but she was mistaken. She had barely taken four steps before Pelano fell into step next to her, hands clasped behind his back and chin raised imperiously.

"And what clues have you found so far?" he asked. "Anything conclusive?"

"I've been on the job for officially," she consulted the chrono on her armored vambrace, "an hour. So... no. Not yet."

"Hmm," Pelano grunted. "You will keep me posted on your findings, will you?"

She scoffed. "Why? Last I checked, I’m not working for you."

"I have been tasked by the Governor to find and silence a leak within our ranks,” Pelano said. “Someone who is supplying Uruc with classified information. So you could say that our jobs are... mutually beneficial."

"I'm not being paid to help you out with your little investigation. All I'm here to do is find Uruc, capture her, and turn her in to your boss. Maybe she'll crack under interrogation and spit up a name.” She shot him a seemingly innocent smile, though she did her best to pour every ounce of contempt she could into the motion. “Until then, you'll just have to get off your neatly-pressed backside and do the job yourself."

She expected an uptight  _shabuir_  like Pelano to take offense at her ridicule, but to her surprise he just laughed. "Amusing," he chuckled as they drew up to the speeder. "But I am not joking. I’m ordering you to provide me with daily reports of your progress-"

She stopped next to the bus and spun to face him, poking him in the chest and wrinkling his perfectly-ironed uniform.

"Listen," she said with a scowl, "There are a few things we have to set straight. Firstly, I've been privately contracted by Imperial Intelligence, not Mon Cal Imperial Command. So you have _exactly_ no authority over me. Secondly, I wouldn't give you those reports even if you  _could_  order me around.”

“And thirdly,” she dropped her prodding finger and moved away from him, “keep your distance; I've got enough problems right now without you butting into my job. Just let me do what I’ve been hired to do and I’ll be out of your hair before you know it."

She pounded on the side of the speeder bus and the pilot popped the door. She only made it up the first two stairs when Pelano laughed again. "I like your spirit, bounty hunter. It is rare to find such fire among your kind. Maybe you can deliver your first report over dinner? At the upcoming banquet, perhaps?"

She paused, her face drawing down in a deep scowl. Was he seriously  _still_  demanding reports, and on top of asking her out on a  _date_? She could barely believe his audacity. Even for an Imperial, he didn’t know when to take no for an answer.

“Not going to happen,” she said, brushing away his offer as nonchalantly as she could manage.

“And why, if I may inquire,” Pelano said with a sickeningly patronizing smile, “will it not happen?”

"I happen to be in a... perfectly happy relationship," she lied. "With a  _Mandalorian_. A very jealous Mandalorian."

The overbearing man’s chuckles stopped almost instantly, and a small, triumphant grin flashed across her lips at his dismay. She half-turned back to him, still smiling that sweet and innocent smile.

"Like I said: keep your distance."

Then she stepped onto the bus, slammed the door behind her, and glared at him through the viewports until the speeder took off and blasted away into the sky. After only moments, he and Lieutenant Floren were little more than insects against the rest of Saiton city.

~~~~~~~~

"So," Vhetin said when he and Jay met up with Brianna again, "what've you got for me?"

The huntress unzipped the pack on her hip and pulled out a burnt, blasted piece of marble. She tossed it to him and he snatched it out of the air faster than Jay's eyes could follow. He rolled it around in his hands for a moment, then looked up at his girlfriend. "You think I'll be able to read something from this?"

She shrugged and folded her arms across her chest, grimacing against the cold, drizzling rain.The three hunters were standing on one of the balconies of the Imperial Security Bureau complex, in private offices Vonn had loaned them for the purposes of their hunt. They needed someplace private to work on the next part of their plan, free from the hectic bustle of the evacuation.

The view that was afforded to them from the balcony was of a dreary gray city masked by distant sheets rain and occasionally illuminated by strikes of lightning. The few organic parks that were scattered around the city were full of trees bending back and forth in the gale and releasing clouds of leaves to float along currents of the wind. There seemed to be an unbearable tension on the air as the hurricane approached, darkening the sky on the horizon like an old description of the Corellian Apocalypse.

Jay shivered and thought,  _I_   _was_   _under_   _the_   _impression_   _that_   _Saiton_   _City_   _was_   _a_   _tropical_   _paradise. But this place_ _…_

She looked up at the stormy sky, at the near-pitch-dark clouds of the hurricane that was massing on the horizon. It was about as far from a tropical paradise as she could imagine. And she knew it would only get worse the longer they spent in this city.

"Whatever we're going to do, we'd better get it done fast," she said. "Imperial weather reports are showing that the storm is going to hit this city in force by tomorrow."

“Will the shields hold?” Brianna inquired.

“They should,” Jay said. “But until the wind gets _really_ strong, they won’t up the power and seal off the city. Too many evacuees going back and forth. And that means the shields won’t do _osik_ to keep out the weather. It’s going to get bad before it gets better.”

“Fair enough,” the Coruscanti woman said. “Then let’s get this show on the road.”

"In the meantime," Vhetin murmured, still staring at the piece of rubble in his hand, "the place is almost empty. Should help us track down any of Uruc's operatives still hiding out here."

"And... how exactly is that going to help?" Jay nodded to the blasted rock in his hand.

Vhetin glanced up at her. He seemed to have been just as focused on the piece of rubble as she was.

"Um..." he hesitated. "Well, I can..."

Brianna stepped in. "Vhetin has a special skill he can use to recreate the scene of the hostage situation."

"From a piece of rubble?" Jay was doubtful. Vhetin was imaginative, but how could he recreate the entire complex hostage situation from looking a single piece of rubble? "How? Planning on running some forensic scans?"

"Ever heard of psychometry?"

“Not… particularly…” Jay frowned. “It sounds familiar, but…”

“It’s a, um… talent of mine.” Vhetin’s voice still sounded reluctant. “It’s… well, it’s the ability to study the history of any inanimate object by touch. I can _see_ the history of an object, simply by holding it.”

Jay frowned at her partner with a derisive scoff, openly skeptical now. "Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

She looked to Brianna in disbelief. The woman shrugged. “I’ve seen Cin do some crazy things. If he says he can do it, then he can do it.”

Jay shook her head. “You may be some kind of supersoldier for all I know, Stripes, but you're not a Jedi. No offense."

"None taken," Vhetin murmured, still staring at the marble chunk in his hand. "The effectiveness of my ability doesn't require your belief in it."

“Whether it's real or not,” Brianna pointed out, “he can get results. He hasn’t been wrong yet."

“If you say so…”

Vhetin walked back into the empty office room, moving silently into the shadows and sitting cross-legged in a dark corner of the room.

"Make yourselves comfortable," he said, bowing his helmeted head. He pulled his left glove free of his gauntlet and set it on the floor next to him. He picked up the piece of rubble with his bare hand, then rested it on the ground in front of him and let his hand drape loosely over its surface. "If you want me to get anything accurate from this thing, I'm going to be here for a while."

Brianna nodded and patted Jay's shoulder. "Come on, Rookie. Cin will tell us if he finds anything. The file the Imps gave us lists a former Jabiimi Resistance Movement operative who lives here in Saiton."

"Kile," Jay said, remembering reading the same file earlier.

"Let's go give him a visit, huh?"

"Yeah," Jay said absently, still staring at Vhetin. The man seemed to get more and more mysterious the longer she knew him. "Lets."


	6. Ambush!

**One**   **hour**   **later, Saiton City refugee**   **sector**

Jay’s eyes roamed over the dilapidated buildings, the streets overflowing with trash, and the flickering street lights. There were market stands set up on every street corner, all long abandoned. A few furtive eyes stared at them through darkened windows, but it looked like the majority of the residents had left with the other evacuees.

She hooked her thumbs in her belt as she walked, one hand kept purposefully near her blaster while the other hovered over her credit chit. She didn’t trust either to leave her grasp in this area. "So this is the refugee sector, huh? Looks like Keldabe. All we need is a Mon Cal branch of the  _Oyu'baat_ and it's just like home."

The streets and buildings were all painted a kind of pale gray-blue, looking dark and foreboding in the light of the cloud-wreathed sun setting behind them. It was shabby, but not quite the dump many imagined when they thought  _refugee_   _sector_. There was a line of twenty story buildings on the left side of the street while smaller apartment buildings made up the right. Apparently the city had such a large population, even the slums boasted skyscrapers.

Brianna laughed as she picked her way around a rubbish pile that had spilled out into the street. "I'm going to tell Aramis that you said that. In the meantime, let's stay focused. We have a former resistance guerrilla on our hands. He may be fifty some years old, but he's still dangerous."

"You've probably got more than enough weapons to take him," Jay said, adjusting the pistol on her hip.

Ever since arriving, Jay had been studying Brianna’s gear: a form-fitting armorleather vest cut at the shoulder and waist to reveal a tantalizing amount of bare flesh, complemented by thick black cargo pants and armored boots that stopped mid-way up her shins. She had two large blaster pistols holstered on the back of her belt and a holo-pad-equipped forearm plate on one arm. A tall shoulder guard covered her right shoulder, protecting her neck and collar from unwanted attack. A long-handled Mandalorian  _beskar_  saber hung across her back and a bandolier of low-power stun grenades was hooked over her other shoulder. She was truly the perfect image of a bounty huntress: attractive, deadly, and ready for any action that could present itself. Jay, with her single pistol and vibroblade down one boot, seemed rather insignificant by comparison.

"Do you think this Kile guy will have any information for us?" Jay asked her. "Just because he served in the JRM with Uruc doesn't necessarily mean he's in league with her."

"Even if he just has the name of her pet Gizka," Brianna said, keeping a watchful eye on the buildings to either side of the street, "it'll be more information than we have now. What does the reader say?"

Jay consulted her datapad, looking at the GPS system in particular. It showed a map of Saiton City with a small red dot drawing ever closer. The dot represented the home address of a human man named Torren Kile, a former Jabimmi Resistance Movement guerrilla with several warrants. The reward for his arrest was just over a thousand credits.

She nodded to the street ahead. "His apartment is in the building two blocks up, third floor."

Brianna’s lips pursed and she set off in that direction. Jay fell into step beside her, readjusting her pistol holster again. It didn't matter that she'd survived more than one firefight in the past, she was still nervous at the thought of a potential conflict with this man. She had no desire to fight him if she could avoid it.

She let out a long and lingering exhale. Brianna must have sensed her unease (not difficult, if she was being honest with herself) because she looked over and said, "Are you nervous, Rookie?"

"A little."

"Don't be. This is just a routine house call from specially appointed Imperial  
agents.” She winked at her companion. “Nothing for Kile to get in a fuss about."

"I'm not sure where you grew up," Jay said, "but on Corellia, Imperial agents didn't come knocking down my door every other day. I think it's safe to assume that Kile is going to panic when we get there."

Brianna grinned. "Then our job just gets that much more fun. Chasing people down is one of my favorite parts of bounty hunting."

"Why?" Jay remembered the frantic chase through Anchorhead City during the Kassh contract. She had almost been shot several different times during that single occurrence. She was in no mood for a repeat of that particularly harrowing adventure.

"I'm  _very_  fast.” Brianna shot her a mischievous grin. “And I like to show it off."

Jay snorted as they fell into silence, heading for the building two blocks down. The city was eerily quiet for this time of day. Jay could almost imagine how this place looked before the storm: children running and laughing along the sidewalks, merchants peddling their wares and shouting out their prices to passerby, Quarren mercenaries talking furtively in the shadows of the towering buildings as they debated contract fees. Were it not for the hurricane bearing down upon them all, Jay could almost imagine enjoying a trip to this place.

Brianna sighed. Most would have missed it, but the eerie silence that hung over the city made it difficult to hide the sound.

Jay glanced over at the other woman, then said decided it was time to own up to her nosiness earlier. In inquiring — no, in  _demanding_  — to know details of Vhetin and Brianna's personal life, she had seriously overstepped her bounds as Vhetin’s partner. To Jay, that was a serious betrayal of their trust and it had to be set right.

"Um... look," she began hesitantly. "I wanted to apologize. About earlier, when we were in orbit. I shouldn't have pried into your personal life with Vhetin."

Brianna shook her head with a dismissive grunt. "It's not your fault. It's kind of... well, it's our fault for letting our argument spill over into the job. It was unprofessional of us both."

She hesitated, looking up into the cloudy sky with a weary huff. "It's just… just difficult, you know? When someone you care about can't even admit to the same feelings? When they're so cold that you can't even say you love them without being passive-aggressively rejected?"

Jay couldn't quite claim she knew what that was like, but she couldn't say that she was surprised. Vhetin, for all his quiet calm and level-headedness, was ice-cold to the point that some people said he felt no emotion at all. When she herself first heard of the relationship between the Mando and Brianna, she could hardly believe her ears.

"Everyone goes through troubles," Jay said slowly, weighing her words carefully to avoid her previous error. "Just because you two are bounty hunters doesn't make you any different."

Brianna let out a quiet chuckle. "Yeah... you know, Venku gave me the same speech. Told me that Vhetin was just shy and needed time to get his act together."

Jay laughed for real now. "Vhetin?" she said. "Shy? Venku seems nice, but he doesn't seem to know Vhetin very well."

The other woman laughed with her; a genuine laugh, free of weariness or worry. "Yeah, that's what I thought too. I actually told Venku he was full of  _osik_."

"Well, I know Vhetin cares about you, and I hope things sort themselves out soon. I mean that."

"Thanks Jay," Brianna replied. "I'm… surprised you care that much."

"Hey," Jay said half-indignantly. " _Vode_   _an. S_ isters all, remember? What kind of student would I be if I didn't pick up the odd  _Mando_  concept?"

She raised an eyebrow. "You know that technically only refers to Mandalorians, right"

Jay shrugged. "Does it matter? The galaxy would be a better place if everyone shared the same sense of camaraderie."

“Be careful,” Brianna said with a good-natured nudge to her arm. “Thinking like that is how they get you. Before long, you’ll be suiting up in _beskar_ _’gam_ and begging them to let you convert.”

Jay laughed and pulled a face. “No thanks. I may get along well with Mandalorians, but I’m not going to be joining their number any time soon. Something I think you can agree with, right?”

Brianna nodded in agreement, then held up her arm and said, "Hold up. This is Kile's apartment building."

Jay tensed, her hand instinctively going to the pistol on her hip. She stared up at the four-story building, every window dark since any inhabitants had long since evacuated. Brianna craned her neck back to look up, up, up to the top of the building. She hooked her thumbs into her belt and let out a whistle.

"Well... it's a good thing we've got his apartment number, otherwise-"

She was cut off as the thunderous  _boom_  of a projectile weapon rang through the still silence of their surroundings. Brianna jumped, her dual pistols instantly in hand and swinging up to aim at the windows. Jay started as well and pulled her own weapon, sweeping the area.

"Gunshot," Brianna said, narrowing her eyes as she slowly scanned the hundreds of windows on the left side of the street. "Long-range. An... Aratech, maybe a BlasTech sniper rifle. Heavy duty stuff."

Jay's own heart was pounding in her chest, her gaze roaming all over the street as they both retreated under an awning mounted on the nearest building. As they crouched there in cover, two more shots rang through the air. The echoing _boom_ s of the shots reverberated away down the street, taking a long time to fade away into silence.

Brianna cocked her head, her eyes narrowing as she concentrated. After a moment she cursed and muttered, "Whoever they are, they're not aiming for us."

“Three guesses who they _are_ aiming for,” Jay said with a scowl. Brianna nodded tersely, legs tensing as she prepared to move. Another _boom_ , and this time the older huntress ignored it and broke from cover. She sprinted for the front entrance to the apartment building ahead and gestured for Jay to keep up.

“Come on!” she called over her shoulder. "We need to get to Kile before that  _chakaar_  with the gun finishes the job!"

~~~~~~~~

Two minutes later and Brianna kicked the door in, knocking the plastoid right off its hinges and sending it crashing hard to the ground. She knew the situation was bad from the moment she crossed the threshold of the two-room apartment. The entire area was a disaster zone: sheets of flimsi and random trash littered the floor, holopics hung crooked on the walls, and water damage warped the faded paint on the duracrete walls. The sickly sweet odor of blood lay thick on the air, strong enough to make Brianna's lip curl. A limp form was slumped over the overturned table in the center of the room. It didn’t take much to recognize the man. It was Kile.

"Check him," she ordered as she moved in and headed for the fresher, the only other room in the apartment. With another well-placed kick, she knocked the door open and stepped inside. Her pistols swept over the area and her eyes lingered on all the corners and nooks where an intruder could hide. There was no such intruder. She paused for a single moment, then lowered her weapon and called back, "We’re clear."

Jay moved into the apartment now, holstering her own blaster, and cautiously made her way to the dead man at the table. She put two fingers to his neck, checking for a pulse. A moment was spent listening, waiting, before she pulled back and shook her head.

"He's dead.”

Brianna cursed and moved to the window, scanning the street outside for hostiles. There was no one in sight. She sneered and hissed, “Damn it all…”

"It looks like he was trying to leave in a hurry," Jay observed, gesturing to the mess around them and to a pile of half-packed travel bags scattered on a cot near one wall. "Do you think he knew we were coming?"

"I don't know.” Brianna shook her head and finally returned her own pistols to the holsters mounted on the back of her belt. “All that matters is that  _someone_  did. And that someone just slotted our only lead."

She stepped toward the window and traced her fingers along three large holes blown through the plastoid window. The force of the impact hadn’t managed to shatter the faux-glass material, but it did manage to create a latticework of tiny spiderweb cracks.

"Sniper rounds," she breathed, half to herself. "Three-oh-eight caliber projectiles."

Jay frowned. “I didn’t know anyone still used projectile weapons any more.”

“Civilized individuals like to believe we live in a more advanced day and age,” Brianna said, still staring at the bullet holes. “But the truth is that projectile guns are still highly effective weapons.”

“For what?”

“Brute force attacks,” the veteran huntress said. “Attacks that need to be flashy, bloody, and cause a lot of pain. And I’ve heard they’re particularly effective when trying to kill Jedi.”

Jay raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

A nod from Brianna. “Jedi could use lightsabers to knock away blaster bolts with ease. But you can’t deflect a bullet. For now, check the body. See if these bullets are what did him in.”

Jay quickly checked over Kile's body again, then nodded. Her face pulled into a mask of distaste. "Yeah. It looks like he’s got three big puncture wounds in his chest."

"For such an accurate shot through a kriffing window, the shooter couldn't have been stationed too far away.”

"I don't know if you've noticed," Jay said, scooping up a handful of flimsi discarded carelessly on the floor, "but we're in the middle of a city. Lots of windows. It's going to take too much time to do a full search this entire area for a sniper who probably bugged out five minutes ago."

As she surveyed the area outside, a staccato flashing caught Brianna's eye. At first she thought it was simply the setting sun reflecting off the windows on the other side of the street. But it continued with a strange rhythm, blinking from of the darkness of a window on the fifteenth floor of a building across the street with a steady pulse. It almost looked like an old signal light _Mando'ade_  used to transmit coded messages in ancient  _dadita._

She frowned and gestured for Jay to draw closer. "Hey, Rookie," she said. "Come and take a look at this."

Jay looked up from her inspection of the flimsi documents and quickly moved closer.

"What's up?" she asked, looking out the window next to her companion. Brianna pointed out the flashing light.

"What do you think that is? A vid recorder?"

The light blinked and turned red. Jay's eyes flew wide.

" _Down_!"

She shoved Brianna out of the way of the window, making the other woman stumble back and trip over an overturned wastebasket. She sprawled back onto the dirty floor with a grunt of surprise and cried out, "Ow! What the  _hell_  is your prob-"

The wall exploded in a wash of flame and rubble, only seconds after Jay had somersaulted out of the way. A billowing cloud of debris and fire flowed through the room with a roar to rival the most enraged rancor. Brianna shouted in surprise and held up an arm to shield her eyes as a rain of hot duracrete chips scattered around her. Jay fell to the ground and covered her head with both hands as the fire washed over her.

The torrent lasted only a moment before it faded into oblivion, leaving the two huntresses in shocked and terrified silence. As the rumble of the explosion slowly died away, Jay looked up with watering eyes, still covering her head, while Brianna coughed and she brushed hot duracrete chips off of her body.

"What the hell was that?" she croaked, staggering back to her feet. Ash floated lazily through the air in the aftermath of the explosion. She coughed again and wiped soot from her face, surveying the meter-and-a-half hole that had been punched through the duracrete wall. The ragged edges were still red-hot and dripping molten synthstone. "I've never seen anything like it before."

Jay groaned as she pushed herself to her feet. She shook her hair back out of her face, which was also dirty and smeared with soot. "Merr-Sonn plasma missile launcher. Imperial tech. The Marines in my Navy unit wouldn’t shut up about it. The flashing light you saw was the infrared targeting laser."

"That thing would have blown me to red paste.” Brianna shook her head before coughing again, covering her mouth with the back of one head. “Thanks, Rookie."

"Don't mention it."

A long rappelling rope flew down from the open window across the street from which the rocket had flown. Moments later, a black-clad form hauled itself over the balcony outside and slid down. Brianna saw the man’s descent through the hole blasted into the wall and her face pulled down in a dark scowl.

"Come on!" she snarled. "He's making a run for it!"

“Wait, what are you—”

Brianna didn’t answer, instead pulling a line of whipcord from her belt. The magnetized grapple hook snapped into the ground and anchored there, allowing her to throw herself through the blasted hole and rappel down to the nearest rooftop a few meters down. Jay, after a moment of surprise, followed her down the rappel line and landed hard next to her, driven to her knees by the drop.

Across the street, the black-clad man hit the ground and took off running as soon as his boots hit the sidewalk. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the huntresses pursuing him. They took off at a sprint as well, keeping up with their would-be assassin as they leapt from rooftop to rooftop. Thankfully, the buildings were so close together here that traversing them was a cinch and they were easily able to hop from rooftop to rooftop with only a little difficulty.

Brianna drew her pistols and squeezed off four shots at the assassin, making the man stumble as bolts of superheated gas peppered the ground at his feet. She cursed and picked up the pace, aware of Jay doing the same next to her.

"You know," Jay panted as they scrambled up onto another rooftop above them, "Vhetin and I chased after an assassin in Anchorhead, too. How many times do you guys have to do this?"

"Less talk," Brianna growled, willing her legs to move faster as she saw the black-clad assassin pulling ahead of them. She threw herself over a low-built wall and rolled when she hit a few feet down to soften the landing. When she came up to her feet again, she called, "More  _running!_ "

They hopped down onto a lower building, closer to the ground now than before. Jay stumbled slightly but Brianna rolled again as she landed and came up moving faster than before.

"Keep up!" she shouted over her shoulder, keeping the assassin in sight. Jay muttered something Brianna couldn't hear, but managed to increase her pace and keep pace behind the other huntress. Before long, the two came to a vertical drain pipe that looked more than hefty enough to hold their weight. Brianna clambered down like a monkey-lizard descending a tree trunk, then dropped the last few feet and landed hard on the street below. Jay was right behind her.

They now had their target in their sights, on even ground. But their descent had cost them; even as they took off running again, it was clear he was drawing further and further away.

“We're going to lose him!” Jay cried as they ran. Her breath was coming in sharp gasps. Brianna didn't answer, opting instead to pump her legs harder. Her thoughts darted back and forth, simultaneously keeping track of the black-clad man’s position, her ammunition count, her breath control, and the location of her companion. It was like all existence had been focused down into those simple topics. Nothing else outside this chase mattered.

Some distance ahead now, the assassin ducked down a side street and vanished. She gritted her teeth and thought,  _There_   _is_   _no_   _way_   _you're_   _getting_   _away,_ chakaar _. Not_   _after_   _you_   _nearly_   _blew_   _the_   _both_   _of_   _us_   _to hell._

But their quarry was once again a step ahead of them. The huntresses rounded the corner just as the shooter slipped into the ranks of no less than six other men, all clothed in black jumpsuits and masks. Two carried heavy weapons and the rest were armed with activated vibroswords that sizzled and spat emerald sparks. They didn’t seem surprised to see the huntresses hot on their companion’s heels and wasted no time fanning out in a rough U-shape around their opponents, hefting their weapons with menacing purpose. The assassin slipped through their lines and dashed away down the alley without ever looking back. After a few moments, he was gone.

 _Shit_ , she thought. _By the time we_ _’re done with these goons, he’ll be long gone._

Brianna surveyed the men assembled before her with a sneer, breathing hard as she reloaded her pistols.

“Hello, boys,” she said, raising her hefty weapons to shoulder-level with barrels pointed to the sky. From this position she could fire off a flurry of shots at a moment’s notice. “Kindly step aside and let us pass. We’d hate to have to get rough with you.”

"Turn around and leave," said one of the larger thugs, a humanoid being hefting a bulky Merr-Sonn rotary blaster cannon. He gestured to them with its segmented barrel as he took another step forward. "In fact, leave kriffing Mon Calamari. If not, we're all gonna have some fun."

The thugs chuckled to each other, leering at the two huntresses and slapping their weapons against their palms.

"Let me guess," Jay panted, her hands on her knees as she caught her breath, but not far enough away from her pistol that she wouldn't be ready for a fight, "you're the thugs that do Uruc's dirty work?"

The big thug let out a rumbling laugh and growled, "The boss doesn't like you prying into her business. Kile was already trying to turn her over to the Imps, looking for a reward, and look where  _that_  got him.”

He gestured with his cannon again. "Now it's your turn. What do you say, ladies? Wanna play?" He took another step forward.

One step too many. Brianna’s pistols came down and discharged, kicking hard in the cup of her palms. The big guy crumpled without another word, his rotary cannot hitting the duracrete pavement below with a _crack._ The rest of his group stood frozen in shock, staring at his body. Then they turned back to the offending huntresses, their masked faces turning down in mirrored scowls.

"Nice move," Jay muttered with a scowl of her own. She drew her pistol into her hand and the weapon spun up with a high-pitched whine. "They're  _definitely_  going to leave us alone now."

As one, the thugs charged.

~~~~~~~~

Jay barely had time for thought as the thugs raced forward, instead instinctively raising her blaster and firing as fast as her finger could mash the firing stud. She managed to drop one of the goons before they got to close enough quarters that her pistol was rendered useless.

She glimpsed Brianna tossing her pistols aside, backpedaling as she drew the  _beskad_  saber sheathed across her back. She raised the heavy weapon in time to block a slash to her throat and brought her knee hard up into her attacker's groin. The man doubled over and fell back, but was quickly replaced by another assailant coming to pick up his slack.

The other huntress was blocked form view as Jay ducked, dodging one of the thugs as he swiped at her head with his humming vibrosword. She holstered her pistol and pulled the vibroblade that was sheathed down one of her boots. It activated with a buzz, the hand-length blade lighting up with flickering green light as she slashed at her attacker's stomach. With a shout, the thug staggered back, hands pressed tightly to the bleeding gash in his abdomen.

It wasn’t a fatal wound, but Jay didn't focus on finishing him off. There were still three others to deal with.

She brought the hilt of her vibroblade across another thug's head, making him stumble away cursing, and caught a glimpse of Brianna ramming her simple metal blade through an opponent's chest. The sword erupted from his back with a sickening crackle of ripping flesh and bone. The man stiffened as his killer planted a boot in his stomach and pushed him away.

The bleeding thug had since recovered from his stomach wound and backhanded Jay across the face, taking advantage of her momentary distraction. She cried out and stumbled back against the alley wall. The man followed close behind, reinforced by his other comrade. As they reached for her, however, she kicked out horizontally with her foot - a useful melee move she had learned from numerous sparring matches with Vhetin - and caught them both in the heels, sending them sprawling to the ground. Panting, she pulled her pistol and shot them both in the chest with stun bolts. They twitched and convulsed on the dirty ground, engulfed in blue-white lightning, then lay still.

She turned just in time to see Brianna grab a handful of the last thug's mask and slam his face against the alley wall. There was a wet  _crack_  as the man's nose broke. Brianna yanked him back and slammed him forward again, then again. Only when his arms went limp did she finally let him fall to the ground. He sprawled into a heap with a pained gurgle.

The fight was over and the alley was suddenly silent, save for the quiet rumble of speeders hundreds of feet above them and the distant, ever-present roar of Mon Cal's endless ocean waves. Brianna was breathing hard, bleeding from a shallow cut on her forehead. She held a hand to her ribs with a pained grimace, then looked up at Jay.

"You okay?"

"Yeah." Jay nodded. The slap she'd received still stung, but it was a small price to pay considering the damage they had dished out. "Who are these guys?"

"Let's find out," Brianna said with a scowl, wiping blood from her forehead. She knelt and grabbed the nearest living man by the front of his jumpsuit. With a wrench, she yanked him up to a rough sitting position. His head lolled onto his shoulder.

"Hey, buddy," she said, her palm cracking hard across his face. He didn't stir, so she struck him again, harder this time. "Wake up,  _chakaar_. We've got questions for you."

When he still didn't move, Brianna frowned and pulled off his mask. What was revealed was a fairly normal-looking human male in his late twenties, with spiky black hair and tattoos on his forehead. His eyes were rolled back in his head and his tongue hung fat and limp from slack jaws. Thick white froth was bubbling out of his mouth.

“ _E chu ta!_ _”_ Brianna cursed in Huttese.

"What the…" Jay frowned as the other woman dropped the man with another hissed curse. "What happened to him?"

"Suicide pills," Brianna said in disgust, turning away to retrieve her discarded pistols. "They must have had them hidden under their tongues or something. Cowards."

"Why?"

"In case they failed," Brianna said, checking the rest of the thugs. It was the same with every man the huntresses had left alive. Each was dead, foam bubbling from their mouths and dribbling down their chins in thick, sticky strands. "It's insurance, so they won't have the opportunity to crack under interrogation."

“Normal thugs don’t do that, I’m guessing?”

The older huntress kicked the nearest body once, then turned away ran a hand through her hair, "It’s a good bet these goons were in contact with Uruc's Thirteen Warriors and not just local idiots. That assassin probably was as well."

"So we were right?" Jay said. "Kile had something to do with Uruc and her Warriors?"

"Probably," Brianna sighed. "That kriffer said Kile was trying to turn Uruc in himself, claim the bounty all for his own. But we'll never know for sure now, will we?"

She sat heavily on a nearby crate, gingerly pressing her fingers to the cut on her temple. Jay didn't sit; her heart was pounding too fast to even contemplate rest.

"We should stay here,” Brianna said. “Law enforcement officers will be here before long, and we should be here to explain the situation."

Jay nodded as the other huntress pulled her datapad from the pack on her hip, no doubt prepping a report to give to law enforcement officers and sending Vhetin a message about what had happened. Jay turned back to the alley, kneeling over the dead thugs with their hollow eyes and frothy mouths. Her lips pursed into a thin, worried white line.

 _When_   _Vhetin_   _and_   _I_   _were_   _hunting_   _Kassh,_ she thought,  _everyone_   _was_   _scared_   _enough_   _of_   _their_   _boss_   _to_   _try_   _and_   _kill_   _us_   _on sight. But_   _they_   _never_   _considered_   _killing_ themselves  _rather_   _than_   _admit_   _failure._

She suddenly felt overwhelmed, like she was far, far out of her league. These weren’t just dumb brutes or criminalized businessmen like Kassh and his ilk. They were ruthless, cold-hearted killers ready to take out whover they needed to accomplish their goals. Uruc was a breed apart from the usual scum hunters faced, and she would definitely  _not_  go down without a fight. Her frown deepened with worry and she shook her head with a small sigh.

She had a bad feeling about all of this.

"That's odd.” Brianna, meanwhile, was frowning with equal consternation at her datapad. She tapped in a sequence of codes, then cocked her head as she read. “We've got a message from Cin."

“Really?” Jay glanced over at her, interested. "Well don’t keep it to yourself. Let's hear it."

Brianna activated the message, and Vhetin's recorded voice suddenly spoke through the pad's small speakers.

" _Whatever you two are doing_ ," the Mandalorian said, " _drop it and get back to the Imperial Security Bureau. I've found out what Uruc and her Warriors were after._ "

Jay and Brianna frowned to each other in confusion. Jay was sure Brianna’s thoughts matched her own: He knew what Uruc wanted already? They’d only left him a few hours ago!

" _It's a bomb_ ,” Vhetin said. _“A bomb that's going to level this entire city if we don't find it._ "


	7. Tish Wouta

**Two**   **hours**   **later**

Vhetin pushed his way through the crowd of enforcement officers. The dizzying array of emergency lights flashing through the darkness and the sound of over thirty officers combing the area for evidence would be disorienting to anyone, but the extra information thrown at him by his overtaxed HUD just made matters worse.

He hadn't heard from Bri or Jay since they had gone to investigate Torren Kile apartment some two and a half hours earlier. Then, just minutes ago, he had heard an emergency broadcast over all comm channels for all law enforcement officers in the area to converge on the apartment complex. The dispatcher said that there had been a firefight and that there were multiple casualties.

His heart was pounding in his ears as he thought,  _If_   _anything_   _happened_   _to_   _either_   _of_   _them..._

"Let me through!" he snapped, shoving a protesting enforcement officer out of the way. "I'm supposed to be here, you miserable  _hut'uun!_ "

Images of the two lying dead in the alley flashed through his mind, images of them silenced by his inability to help them, to protect his loved ones.

 _Calm_   _down,_  he thought.  _Calm_   _down, you_   _don't_   _know_   _what_   _happened_   _yet._

He broke through the front line of officers and saw a back alley crowded with forensic scientists studying a collection of black-clad bodies. His heart almost stopped before he realized that they were all men, dressed in dull black jumpsuits that made them hard to pick out in the flickering illumination of the emergency lights.

He froze where he was, frantically searching for Brianna and Jay, and he almost collapsed in relief when he finally spotted them. They had been pulled off to one side and were talking to one of the enforcement officers, who was taking notes. From where he was standing, they looked unscathed, save for a small bandaged cut on Brianna's forehead. He almost had to sit down, relief making his legs weak.

"-like I said," Brianna was saying, sounding exasperated as she rubbed her eyes wearily, "we were heading to the apartment when we heard three shots from a sniper rifle. We got up into the apartment to investigate when..."

She trailed off as she looked over the officer's shoulder and saw Vhetin standing there. She blinked once as if in disbelief, then pushed the officer aside and broke into a run. She threw her arms around him as soon as she was close enough and hugged him tightly.

Normally, he would have been uncomfortable at such displays of affection, but now he just didn't care and instead of pushing her away, he hugged her back. All he cared about now was that she and Jay were safe.

"I'm so sorry I didn't call," she whispered, hugging him tighter if possible. "We've been so tied up with these stupid enforcement officers that I couldn't call you."

He had never been so glad to hear her smooth Coruscanti accent, and he said, "I was worried about you. I didn't know anything besides what was on the police report."

She pulled back and smiled, giving him a gentle headbutt, the closest two people could come to a kiss when at least one of them was in armor. "Come on," she said, "you didn't really think a couple hired thugs could drop me and the Rookie? I'm touched by your confidence."

He smiled behind his helmet as he clasped her hand tightly. "I just thought..."

She shook her head, cutting him off. "It doesn't matter. We're both fine."

Jay stepped towards them at a more sedate pace, rubbing her wrist and glancing around at the assembled Imperials self-consciously.

"What about you?" Vhetin asked her, still holding Brianna's hand tightly. "Are you okay?"

She nodded as she adjusted her armorleather jacket and said, "I'm fine. Stupid schuttas surprised us more than anything. They didn't stand a chance."

He sighed in relief and nodded. "Good. What's the word about the whole deal?"

"Not that we've told the enforcement officers as much, but they were Uruc's hitmen," Bri explained, stepping back toward the alley. "They kept us busy while an assassin we were chasing managed to escape."

"Did any of them tell you anything?"

Bri shook her head. "They killed themselves before we could question them."

"What about Kile?"

Jay sighed. "Dead," she said. "He was shot by the assassin a couple minutes before we got there. The coward tried to do us in, too."

Vhetin craned his neck back and surveyed the apartment building, his gaze lingering on the huge hole that had been blown in the wall.

"A missile, I would guess," he said. "Almost looks like the explosive imprint of one of those old Hailfire droid missiles."

"New Imperial technology," Jay explained. "A targeting missile round."

"I would be dead right now if it wasn't for Jay's instincts," Bri said, sounding appreciative. "She saved my life."

Vhetin looked at his partner, impressed. "Really?  _Oya, Ja'ika._ Way to keep on your toes."

She blushed at the praise, but said, "We have more important things to focus on. When you left a message earlier, you mentioned some kind of bomb. What were you talking about?"

Brianna nodded and looked at him, frowning. "You sounded worried."

Vhetin nodded, almost instantly back to business. He glanced over his shoulder and motioned them to follow him down a deserted side alley.

Once he was sure they were out of earshot of the present Imperials, he turned back to them and took a deep breath. He fished in his belt-pouches for a moment, pulling out the broken chunk of marble that Bri had taken from the ruins of the Imperial Garrison Command.

"I took a shot at reading this," he said, tossing the hunk of rubble to Brianna, "and after about twenty minutes, I was able to get a clear picture."

"I still don't believe you can read the history of something just by touching it," Jay murmured quietly.

"Believe it or not," he replied calmly, "you're going to want to hear what I found out."

He folded his arms across his chest and said, "I was able to get a clear image of what Uruc's thugs were doing. They were hacking the Imperial database, looking through all kinds of military files. Since the terminals were located at Imperial Garrison Command, it was just a matter of presenting the right security clearance and they were in."

"What were they after?" Bri asked him, tossing the chunk of marble from hand to hand.

"Like I said in message," he explained. "A bomb. More precisely, schematics for a bomb."

Brianna raised an eyebrow and shifted her balance from foot to foot impatiently while Jay's attention was focused unwaveringly on him.

"I was able to see a file number when I was watching the feedback from the rubble," he continued, "so I had Jaing look into an identical database at Mandalore's Garrison Command. He came back with this."

He pulled a holotransmitter from his belt and projected a screen of complicated equipment blueprints into the air between them. Brianna squinted to read the fuzzy words, at which Vhetin explained, "It's a prototype hydro-conversion bomb. A high-frequency ionizer to be precise, with fifteen expulsion-converter tubes and-"

Jay blinked in confusion and shook her head. "In Basic, please? Not all of us are caught up on engineering jargon."

"It basically uses a chemical called polytorizene to make airborne water particles flammable. Then it ignites them."

Jay's eyebrows shot up as she took in the consequences and Brianna let out an impressed whistle. Vhetin had to admit, the situation wasn't pretty. Saiton City was a floating metropolis, resting on an ocean that stretched for thousands of kilometers. If Uruc were allowed to detonate that bomb...

"But we caught a lucky break," he added. "Polytorizene is highly effective only for a short period of time. It has an effective radius of something like two hundred kilometers. With this hurricane bearing down on us, that can fluctuate to up to four hundred kilometers. That's probably when she plans to detonate."

"How is that  _lucky_?" Jay asked. "That's more than enough operational distance to send Saiton City sky-high."

"It's lucky in that Uruc won't burn all of Mon Cal by activating the bomb," Brianna said. "She'll just kill this city and anyone unlucky enough to still be here when the hurricane hits."

She turned back to Vhetin and put her hands on her hips. "What do you think she'll do with this bomb?"

He shrugged. "My guess is that she'll hit the banquet."

"That's a pretty big assumption to make."

"Jay presented a good case earlier," he pressed. "There's going to be a big party with all the biggest Imperial figures on Mon Cal, security's going to be difficult to keep track of with so many guests, and it's going to take place more or less  _right_   _as_  the hurricane gets here."

Bri pondered over this for a time, then reluctantly nodded. "That makes sense. Then she can threaten to set off the bomb unless the Imps hand over a suitable ransom."

Jay nodded as well. "That sounds like her MO. Except that she's not going to let the Imperials go when she gets her ransom."

"That just gives us more time to find the bomb and take it out of commission," Vhetin said.

Jay frowned, biting at her lower lip. "Do you think we should tell the Imperials about this?"

"And then what?" Brianna asked her. "Watch Uruc panic and bug out to find a new target when the Imps beef up their security protocols?"

"Yeah," Vhetin agreed. "We have the upper hand here in that we have a good idea what her next target is. I vote we use that knowledge to our advantage."

"And make  _her_  come to  _us_ ," Jay said slowly, nodding. It was an early lesson that he had taught her; it didn't happen often, but under certain circumstances bounties would just play into the hunter's hands. "That makes sense."

"So," Vhetin said, turning to Brianna, "Jay and I are following your lead, Bri. What's our next move? Just wait for Uruc to come to us?"

Brianna considered for a moment, then shook her head. "We need more info, and the banquet isn't until tomorrow afternoon. I think now is the perfect time to meet my contact."

 

**Midnight**

Jay rubbed her eyes wearily as the three of them walked through the eerily empty streets of Saiton City, joined by a nervous-looking Lieutenant Floren.

"And... you're sure you weren't able to find anything at the scene of the attack?" Floren was asking, casting glances left and right down the dark street.

Brianna shook her head and said, "Nothing. Those assassins were very discreet. Nothing that could potentially link them back to their employers. No scars, no tattoos, no gang signs. Nothing."

"And you have no idea who was trying to kill you?"

"Not a clue. That's the reason were heading to meet my contact."

Jay was moderately surprised at the casualness of Brianna's tone, given the fact that she was lying through her teeth. Floren bought it, though, and nodded to himself as he murmured, "Of course. That makes sense."

"When we do get there," Brianna continued, pointing at Floren, "you'll have to wait outside. This guy is a valuable contact, but he’s skittish as a gizka. I don't want you scaring him away."

"Does he have something to hide from the Imperials?"

"How should I know?" she said. "He's my contact, not my buddy. Either way it doesn't matter, because if we want his information we'll have to play by his rules. So wait outside."

Floren reluctantly nodded again and muttered, "As you wish."

Jay glanced apprehensively at the Imperial, then increased her pace and fell into step next to Vhetin.

"So who is this contact exactly?" she murmured.

He shrugged. "I don't know. Brianna's very protective of the people who provide her with information. I'd be surprised if she lets  _us_  into the building."

"Why?"

"Because these people put their lives, careers, and livelihoods on the line to provide us simple bounty hunters. Dishing out information like they do is dangerous. If a hunter loses a contract and the target tracks it back to the finder, no telling what will happen. Brianna tends to think that deserves more than just money, but mutual respect and trust as well. She bonds with her contacts."

"That doesn't seem smart," Jay observed. "Trusting people who sell information for money?"

"On the contrary," he replied, "it's smarter than it sounds. If your contacts trust you, then they'll be willing to help you get a leg-up. Maybe give you tips before they hand it off to others, maybe put in some extra effort to dig up specialty contracts other hunters can’t find."

He had a point. Jay suddenly remembered the friendly - if fretful - Journeyman Protector, Tarron Matele, who had provided them with invaluable information during the hunt for Kassh Goran. They would have never found the gangster without his help. "Okay, so you have to trust your contacts. But then what?"

"Eventually you gather a network of informants that effectively gives you ears in every spaceport in the galaxy and eyes at every hyperspace checkpoint. It makes your job much easier."

"But you have to be at the beck and call of every being who you toss a cred to," Jay said. "I thought bounty hunters were more independent than that."

"It's more than being at their beck and call," Vhetin said slowly. "You help them because their your friend. Because they put their lives on the line every time they comm you, so it's the least you can do to repay them."

"And," Brianna spoke up suddenly, "your most important hunt may hinge on the generosity of one of those people They could quite literally be the difference between life and death."

Jay wasn't aware that she had been listening. She turned to the other huntress and said, "And you think this guy is going to have some kind of magic information regarding Uruc's hit on the banquet?"

"Maybe. Not much escapes his sticky fingers.”

She gestured to a building up ahead that was plastered with flimsiplast posters: Imperial propaganda posters, images of entertainment groups that had long since passed through, even Black Sun recruitment ads blatantly displayed in broad daylight. The posters were so numerous and plastered on so thick, they had actually been cut away to allow room for the thick, rusty durasteel entrance. The windows were grimy and fogged over, cracked in several places until the interior of the building was visible only as a dark smear even in the light of nearby street lamps. A damaged, flickering holographic sign above the door read  _KITCO'S_   _SPEEDER_   _AND_   _SUBMERSIBLE_   _REPAIR_. It looked like the place had been completely overlooked and ignored for years.

"Business is flourishing, I see," Floren observed sourly, his face curling in disdain. "This place is disgusting."

"You'll be waiting outside, remember?" Brianna said, not looking back at him. "Don't complain. You're getting the easy part of the deal."

The young lieutenant sighed, but turned his back to them, waiting on the street corner with his arms clasped behind his back. Jay watched him for a moment with narrowed eyes, then turned back to the other two hunters and murmured, "I don't trust him. He seems very interested in our business."

"You think so?" Brianna asked, sounding genuinely interested. She kept her gaze on the street ahead as she said, "I kind of like him. He's like a womp rat with a uniform and a twitchy demeanor."

Jay snorted. "That can describe virtually half the Imperial Navy."

Vhetin snorted quietly, but said nothing. Jay ignored him, staring at the ground at her feet and grimacing. As much as she hated to admit it, she had to agree with Floren; this place  _was_  disgusting. Buried deep in the sprawling refugee sector, the street was piled with trash and filth sometimes almost ankle-deep, only a quarter of the glowlamps mounted along the street were functioning and cast eerie, hulking shadows everywhere, and the stink of filth and muck was all-encompassing. Even Vhetin showed signs that he could smell the nauseating stench, though his helmet supposedly had built-in odor blockers. Jay herself was having a hard time keeping her stomach under control, and she wasn't sure how Brianna was able to bear the stink with such stamina.

The area painted a stark contrast to the pristine streets of Saiton that she'd seen around well-kept areas like Imperial Command. This was definitely not on local stormtrooper patrol routes, making the area dangerous and unpredictable, uncharted territory. Then again, that would come in handy, considering that they were about to speak to an underworld contact who may or may not have information on their bounty.

Brianna held open the poster-plastered door for them as they stepped up to the repair shop, jerking her head and saying, "Head on in. I've told him that we're on our way."

Jay was sure to keep her hand on the butt of her pistol as she walked into the small waiting room beyond. Like the outside of the repair shop, the room was in serious disrepair. The walls were plastered with even more posters and sheets of flimsi while the corners of the room were cluttered with trash. Only one mounted glowlamp worked serviceable well, casting dim light on the greenish-tiled walls.

Jay’s lip curled at the sight and smell of the place. It was a wonder this guy was still in business.  _She_  sure as hell wouldn't bring any vehicle here for repair.

Brianna stepped into the room, surveyed the grimy scene with her thumbs hooked into her belt, then stepped up to the front desk - currently vacant - and tapped the service buzzer. A shrill mechanical tone rang through the room, echoing slightly. There was no response. Jay glanced around in confusion, looking at the others for a clue as to what to do. Vhetin was expressionless and calm as usual, his helmeted gaze staring unwaveringly ahead. Brianna tapped one foot impatiently, then hit the buzzer again.

Again, nothing happened.

With a sigh, Brianna glanced over her shoulder at Vhetin, who nodded toward a door behind the front desk marked with the words  _EMPLOYEES_   _ONLY_  in Basic. She lowered her head determinedly and hopped over the front desk to approach the door. She hammered her fist three times against the rusted surface of the durasteel.

"I know you're in there," she called. "Unlock the door."

" _No_ ," came the muffled response.

She huffed. "Are we seriously doing this? Unlock the door.”

" _No_ ," the voice answered firmly.

The huntress stepped back and pulled one of her pistols, aiming it at the door. She racked back the charging rod, making sure the whining of the blaster charging up was clearly audible before saying, "Unlock the door or I blow it down."

When nothing happened, Jay thought that Brianna would actually be forced to blow the door open. She would do it, too, Jay had no doubt. But after a few seconds of silence, there was a scrabbling at the other end of the door, and it opened just a crack.

Jay stifled a gasp as she saw a single pupilless black eye appear through the cracked door, shining in the dim light. She heard a deep voice reply, "What do you want, Bellan?"

"You have to ask?" Brianna raised an eyebrow as she stepped back and holstered her pistol. "It’s not like I make regular social calls to Mon Calamari. Not that your place isn’t…” she grimaced, “…nice...”

The black eye blinked, green lids sliding slowly over the glassy surface, then the door opened to reveal a rather chubby Nautolan dressed in stained coveralls. He clutched a hydrospanner in one hand like a weapon as he slowly stepped out into the room beyond. He had shoulder-length green-brown head tendrils that waved slightly like a breeze through a human's hair. He blinked again as he surveyed them all. As his pupilless gaze fell on Vhetin, his already-large eyes widened, and he scrambled to dive back into the back room.

Jay barely even saw Vhetin move; in the blink of an eye, he was right next to Brianna. Without pause he balled up a fist and punched the Nautolan in the face. The alien staggered back with a cry, his waving head-tendrils flapping in shock and surprise as he held his face.

Jay was more than surprised. She had never seen such unprovoked violence from her partner.

"Tish Wouta.” Vhetin stepped back with a snarl. “I should have known."

The Nautolan cursed as dark blood dripped into his green-skinned palm, then glared up at Vhetin, a frightening look from those huge black eyes. He straightened, balling his fists. "My name is Lin Kitco now, you bucket-head. I should shoot you where you stand for attacking me like that."

"Bring it on,  _aruetii,_ "" Vhetin snapped, pounding a fist against his left chest plate in an open challenge and stepping towards him. “First shot’s free.”

Brianna stepped between the Mandalorian and the Nautolan, holding her hands up in a placating gesture as she said, "Vhetin, calm down. Let me explain."

"There's only one thing to explain," Vhetin said, his hand drifting dangerously close to the shaft of the saber pike hooked to the side of his rocket pack. "And that's that this  _hut'uun_  sold me out to  _Fett_  and left me bleeding in the snow back on Alderaan."

In a lithe motion, he pulled the saber-staff, pointing the emitter in the Nautolan's direction. "You were  _laughing_  as you left me to die there in the mountains, you  _aruetii_  bastard. I think it’s high time I started my scalp collection after all.”

"You  _will not_ ," Brianna pressed, grasping Vhetin's armored gauntlet and putting her other hand on his chest plate. "Wouta's the only reliable source of information that we've got right now. Stand down."

Vhetin did not stand down. If anything, he puffed up even larger. Jay could almost sense the rage pouring off him. But while a lesser woman would have backed down in the face of an enraged Mandalorian, Brianna was no lesser woman. She put both hands on Vhetin’s shoulders and pushed, forcefully walking him back a few steps.

“Cin,” she said in a quiet, serious tone. “We need him. _Stand down._ _”_

The Mandalorian stared at Brianna through his expressionless faceplate for a few moments, long enough to have Jay wondering if he’d listen. Then, to her great surprise, he sighed and lowered his weapon.

"Fine," he spat. He hooked his pike back to his jetpack and stepped away. "I’ll play nice. But I don't trust a single word that comes out of his slimy mouth. You shouldn’t either."

"Hey," the Nautolan, Wouta, growled, pointing a finger at Vhetin, "watch your mouth, bucket-head. Nautolans aren't  _slimy_."

Vhetin said nothing, just stared at the alien with a gaze that, though hidden behind his helmet, still looked as if it could freeze open flames. As he stepped back to stand next to Jay, she leaned over and murmured, "Smooth. I stand in awe of your self-control, Stripes."

He clenched a gloved fist. "That  _utreekov_  almost got me killed. Fett doesn't leave behind witnesses, and it was just dumb luck that I got away. I still have scars from that fight."

Jay shrugged as she watched Brianna exchange calm pleasantries with the Nautolan mechanic, obviously trying to counteract Vhetin's unexpected violence. "I won’t try to second-guess you. But try to refrain from punching the living daylights out of our allies from here on out, okay?"

"I thought you were the rookie," he growled, his gaze never wavering from Wouta. "Doesn't seem fitting that you're the one telling me what to do."

"I wasn't the one who almost completely flattened the only being who might have information on Jolee Uruc."

He said nothing.

With a black-eyed glare at Vhetin, Wouta wiped the last traces of dark blood from his face and said, "Bellan, why are you here? I told you that the only business we do is over comms. I don't like face-to-face meetings."

"For obvious reasons," Jay said, glancing at Vhetin. The Mandalorian was still all but quivering in rage, fists balled up at his sides.

Brianna shot him a warning glance, then said, "Cin will play nice or he’ll answer to me. We need information, Tish, and we need it fast."

"Who're you looking for?" Wouta inquired, narrowing his huge black eyes. The waving tendrils on his head slowed down, and he blinked so slowly that it almost looked as if he were falling asleep. This was the Nautolan equivalent of raising an eyebrow; he was interested. “I don’t recall sending you any local info.”

"We’re after Jolee Uruc," Brianna replied steadily.

Wouta let out a dry chuckle as he hefted the hydrospanner in one green-skinned hand. "That's a little beyond my circle, Bellan. I can't help you. I'd like to, I really would, but-"

"Don't sweet-coat that  _osik_  and try and pass it off as candy," Brianna suddenly snapped. "You’re a black market information broker. Nothingon Mon Cal is _beyond your circle_."

The Nautolan narrowed his eyes again, but said nothing. Brianna held his deep stare for a few moments, then cursed and produced two high-denomination credit chips, seemingly from out of nowhere.

"Talk," she ordered, tossing the chips.

A single long-fingered hand snatched the chips from the air and they vanished as quickly as they had appeared. After a moment, Wouta cleared his throat with a watery gurgle and beckoned for them to follow him into the back room. Vhetin stepped forward a little too fast to look casual, so Jay caught his shoulder and stepped in front of him.

"Calm," she reminded him as she passed.

Wouta led them into a surprisingly clean and spacious workshop. There were three different speeder-submersible convertibles hung on droid arms mounted to the ceiling. Several repair droids were scuttling or rolling about, tweaking bolts or tinkering with engine housings.

Wouta didn't look back as he said, "So big, bad Brianna was tapped to bring in our local lunatic, huh? I was wondering who was going to be picking up the contract. I thought Fett was going to come kicking down my door before too long."

He looked over his shoulder and glared at Vhetin, an alarming look coming from those big black eyes. "Of course, you guys aren't much better."

"Funny," Vhetin grunted. "Get to the point. We want all the info you have, right now."

"It'll cost you," Wouta snapped. "What're you offering?"

"How does _your life_ sound?"

"Boys," Brianna interjected, "please try and keep this civil. There are ladies present, after all."

Wouta snorted, a gurgly, squishy sound. "Fine. What do you want to know?"

"Where she’s hiding would be nice," Jay said.

Wouta turned his dark eyes on her. "A rookie, huh? Well, I don't know if anyone's told you this, but finding these people isn't as easy as you'd think. If it was,  _I'd_  be the karking bounty hunter and wouldn't settle for the scraps tossed to me in return for the occasional tip."

"Stay focused, Wouta," Brianna reminded him. "We’re on a tight schedule. Uruc's got her hands on a hyrdo-conversion bomb that's going to wipe out this entire city if we don't stop her soon."

That stopped him; the Nautolan froze mid-step and his waving head-tendrils instantly fell still. He opened his mouth, shut it again, then said in a strangled voice, "A... a  _what_?"

"A… _really_ big bomb," Brianna said. "It'll engulf Saiton in a fiery explosion that'll kill... well, pretty much everything."

"No pressure, then," Wouta sighed, his head-tendrils beginning to wiggle the slightest bit again. "Sometimes I wonder if this is the Force punishing me for a past life. Kriff it all, but I think... I think I can help you out."

"Good. What do you know?"

Wouta spun and leaned up against the bulkhead of a durasteel-gray submarine, folding his pudgy arms across his chest. "You probably already know about the hit on Imperial Garrison Command, right? Good, so that's what she was looking for? This hydro-corrosive bomb?"

"Hydro-conversion bomb," Vhetin corrected.

"Whatever," Wouta said, waving a hand dismissively. "If that's what she stole, I think I have a good idea of what she's doing."

"Enlighten us," Brianna said.

Wouta let out a long breath and said, "Okay, but try to bear with me, okay? Ten years ago, Uruc was the head of the Jabiimi Resistance Movement. She built the organization up into a real machine, and they were almost able to kick out the Imperials. Then, for no apparent reason, she left Jabiim and disappeared. For a while no one had any idea where she went, but when she came to Mon Cal, I dug a little."

"Why? Why would you take interest in Uruc?"

"Because I knew that she couldn't make it off Jabiim without Imperial help," Wouta said. "She had her face plastered across wanted posters all over that sector. She had to have been smuggled out by either a high-ranker with big connections, or a low-key grunt who wouldn't be noticed."

"Great," Jay said, "so it's either the deadly end of the spectrum, or the invisible one."

"Were you able to find out who smuggled her off planet?"

Wouta shook his head. "No. I wasn't able to find anything out of the ordinary. But it's a good bet that whoever it was followed her here to Mon Cal, either to keep her on a leash, or to keep helping her. Before you ask, I don't know which."

"Why not look at the Imperials who arrived on Mon Cal in the months that Uruc showed up?" Jay asked.

"Are you kidding? There's an entire  _garrison_  here! Hundreds, sometimes  _thousands_  of troop movements a  _day_."

"You have something," Brianna said. "You wouldn't be deliberately wasting our time."

“Don’t sell him short,” Vhetin growled. “Wasting a hunter’s time is his specialty.”

"Think about it," Wouta said, spreading his hands. "You've had a look at Uruc's file, right? Yeah, me too. And have you ever wondered why there's been zero progress on her case? Why - in the entire time she's been pulling crap here on Mon Cal - no one's even come close to bringing her in?"

"Imperial incompetence?" Jay asked hopefully.

Wouta snorted again. "What about her inside intel? Everyone knows the hit on Imperial Garrison Command wasn't just a lucky break. The day the hit went down, three-quarters of the building's security were away on training drills. It was an hour-long opening at the least, so how did she know about it?"

"More than that," Brianna said, frowning, "why was so much of the security force deployed elsewhere at one time? Where was the backup squad?"

Wouta pointed a long finger at her. " _There_  you go. Where indeed?"

She rubbed her chin thoughtfully as everyone lapsed into uneasy silence. Jay frowned as well, staring at the durasteel floor.

This wasn't good. If Uruc had help from within the Empire, there was every chance that her infiltrator knew that there were bounty hunters after her. And Jay didn't fancy a repeat of Kassh's contract, hunting a bounty who knew your every move, who could plan ahead and manipulate you to lead you to your doom.

"Pelano," Brianna said suddenly.

Vhetin's gaze shifted ever-so-slightly to face Brianna. "What?"

"Commander Pelano," she repeated, frowning thoughtfully. "He dropped in on me and Floren while we were investigating what was left of the Garrison Command."

"Oh?" Wouta said, blinking slowly again.

"Yeah, he seemed pretty riled up that a bounty hunter was snooping around. He demanded reports of our progress and even asked me out on a kriffing  _date_."

"You didn't agree to it, did you?" Vhetin asked. Jay couldn't tell whether he was talking about the request for reports or the date.

"Hell no. But it seemed odd at the time, a high-ranking Imp like him taking an interest in a privately-employed bounty hunter."

"There you go," Wouta said, folding his arms and yawning widely. "You've got your first lead."

"Uh-uh," Brianna said, wagging a finger at him. "We need more than that. You said you knew what she was doing."

"I'm getting there," Wouta said. He blinked slowly, then continued, "Now, while she was still on Jabiim, she made a rather large enemy in the local Republic Admiral, a non-clone officer named Vonn."

The three hunters glanced at each other, and Wouta nodded. "Yeah. As in  _Governor_  Vonn."

"Why?" Brianna demanded. "He's an old man."

"He's an old man who used to be in charge of every Republic ship movement in and out of the Jabiim system, as well as the coordinator of the ground attacks against the Separatists that ravaged the planet. If there's a single person directly responsible it would be... well, I don't know, maybe Kenobi since he was the General on the scene, but Vonn was definitely up there. And Uruc blamed him personally. She's been gunning for him ever since."

"Vonn didn't know about this. He would have told us if he did," Vhetin said. "And right now, I trust him more than I trust you."

"You didn't think Uruc just picked Mon Cal at random?" Wouta asked with wide black eyes. "Or did you not notice that she left the JRM the year Vonn was rotated out of the Jabiim sector?"

"Interesting," Brianna said, frowning thoughtfully, "but not enough to help us track her down."

Wouta nodded. "When I found out this little blood feud between the two, I started having some buddies of mine monitor comm chatter between members of the Thirteen Warriors. And it's gotten  _very_  interesting in the past few weeks. Apparently the Warriors see their opening at the banquet that's taking place tomorrow. They're going after Vonn, and they're not going to stop until he's dead. They have a whole battle plan laid out and everything."

Jay clapped her hands and said, "Ha! I  _knew_  it!"

"Save your celebration for now, rookie," Brianna said, holding up a gloved hand to silence her. "Our job just got a lot more dangerous. The Governor needs to be warned as soon as possible."

She turned to Wouta. "Do you have any contact with Uruc? Something we could listen in on?"

Wouta hesitated. "Maybe. But then again, why don't you contact her yourself, Bellan, and cut out the middle-being?"

Jay frowned. "What do you mean by that?"

Wouta's black eyes widened even more, looking almost big enough to take up the entire half of his head. He looked to Brianna and said, "What, you haven't told them?"

"Told us what?" Vhetin said, his voice low.

"If you want someone to infiltrate Uruc's Warriors, she'd probably welcome Bellan with open arms. I mean, she's practically-"

Brianna interrupted the Nautolan with a scowl. "That's not true. Wouta's mistaken. He's been listening to old rumors about me."

"What?" Vhetin asked, his voice very quiet.

"It... It doesn't matter," she sighed. "Let's just get back to the job."

She turned to Wouta, clapped him on the shoulder - a little too roughly to look like a casual motion - and said, "Thanks for the info, Tish. You'll get double pay if you keep us posted on anything you can dig up."

Wouta narrowed his black eyes and tossed his wriggling head-tendrils over his shoulder like a self-conscious teenager. Brianna spun on her heel and quickly left the room, disappearing through the door to the waiting room.

Jay and Vhetin glanced at each other, then Vhetin turned back to Wouta.

"Also," Vhetin added, throwing one last glance over his shoulder at the spot where Brianna had disappeared, "I'm transmitting a list of materials needed to build this hydro-conversion bomb to your datapad. Keep an eye out on any Black Market movements of this equipment, and you'll get paid a bonus."

"Will do." Wouta nodded, narrowing his large eyes in confusion, also staring after Brianna. All animosity between him and Vhetin seemed to have vanished with her strange disappearance. Vhetin nodded distractedly as Jay began moving toward the door and slowly followed her, leaving Wouta to his submersibles.

"What was all that stuff about Uruc welcoming Brianna with open arms?" Jay asked her partner.

Vhetin shook his head, staring at the floor distractedly. "I have no idea. I've never heard Brianna so tense."

Jay sighed and shook her head. "Kark it all, are all you bounty hunters this secretive? I mean, is there  _anything_  you guys tell each other?"

He shrugged, and she could tell that he was only half-listening to her. She stared at him for a moment, then sighed and stepped past him. _Shab_  she was starting to get fed up with all of these hunters and their _lonely warrior_ crap. Was there anything they would share with others? The longer she thought about it, the more she thought that they never would.

"I guess it doesn't matter. We've got a banquet to prepare for. And I'm not going to get a good night's sleep  _again_."


	8. Time to Set the Stage

The rest of that night - and the better part of the next morning - was spent bolstering the defenses of a local restaurant that would be housing the banquet. It wasn't hard work, but it was incredibly time-consuming; the restaurant was a three-story building, and though only the bottom floor was the actual housing area for guests, each level was spacious enough to house a starship the size of  _Void_. Over the course of hours, Vhetin, Jay, and Brianna had to requisition durasteel armor sheets and security holocams from local offices in order to weld them or bolt them to the walls and ceiling, create detailed schematics of the building complex, as well as replace all the simple transparisteel windows with higher-grain material that would stop projectile bullets in case their sniper chose to show up again.

Brianna was speaking to the Imperial security team that would oversee the banquet, running them through certain drills and emergency procedures that would ensure the safety of the Governor and the other Imperials. Vhetin personally thought it was a waste of time. These were the typical stormtrooper grunts with barely enough combat intelligence to tell the barrel of a blaster apart from the handgrip, let alone protect their employers if they came under attack. Just to be safe, however, Brianna had some of the troopers go plainclothes for the banquet so they wouldn't be so easily picked out of the crowd.

Of all three of the hunters, though, Jay had to have the most tedious job of all. She had been tasked with sweeping all three floors for bombs or IEDs - Improvised Explosive Devices. And while the Imperial scanners provided some accuracy when searching for explosives, the majority of her search had to be done manually. And that meant checking every cabinet, every sub-basement, every desk drawer personally. Her job was also the most important, since they had learned from Tish Wouta in subsequent hours that Uruc was planning on smuggling in her newly-built hydro-conversion bomb. There was every chance that the bomb was already hidden within the restaurant, so Jay did not have the luxury of gliding through her task.

After she'd finished her inspection of the level-three ventilation shafts and returned to the main floor covered in dust, she had reported that the building was all clear, with no sign of any explosives or the hydro-conversion bomb. Vhetin was almost relieved, but at the same time worried even more. That meant they still didn't know where the damn bomb was.

Vhetin himself ran a check of the restaurant's minimal security systems, perusing all the files on the building's database for anomalies in case Uruc had planted a bug or virus in the system. His search found nothing out of the ordinary, but he inserted one of Jaing Skirata's custom self-monitoring diagnostic programs into the database just to be sure. The program would alert him if anything in the system accessed any areas it wasn't supposed to.

And all that was just the physical labor. They also had run checks through all the guests, interview all the restaurant's staff in case Uruc had infiltrated already, and bring the governor up to speed on what they'd found.

Vhetin and Jay were currently explaining the situation to Governor Vonn and Lieutenant Floren. Brianna balanced on a ladder behind them, welding an inch-thick sheet of durasteel against the wall, ignoring the indignant cries of the Sullustan restaurant owners as she placed the drab metal sheets over the intricately-carved frescos beneath.

"And you trust your contact?" Vonn said nervously, wringing his wrinkled hands and staring out the new windows to the driving rain outside. "Uruc will definitely strike the banquet?"

"It makes sense, given all that we've found out," Jay said, nodding. "It's the biggest target in all of Saiton. Almost everywhere else is buttoned down for the hurricane."

"Won't she be frightened away by your security measures?" Floren asked, watching Brianna weld the durasteel plates to the wall as the restaurant owners shouted at her, resentfully pounding their fists on the lowest rung of the ladder. The huntress shot them a rude hand gesture, then continued to ignore them.

"Our precautions are all relatively low-key," Vhetin said. "The durasteel will be covered up by fancy wallpaper, and the high-grain transparisteel doesn't look any different from the old windows. I hid the security cams myself, so they're next to invisible. Best-case scenario is that she won't even know they're there."

There was a tremendous crash as Brianna suddenly fell off the ladder, shaken loose by the angry restaurant owners. She landed hard and crashed through a rare wooden table set up with crystalline decanters and dinnerware, sending glass and wood shards everywhere. She cursed fluently in  _Mando'a_  as she struggled to free herself from the pristine white tablecloth, grabbing for her pistols and shouting at the Sullustans, who just gibbered back at her.

Jay grimaced and said, "I should probably go and help out before she shoots someone."

As she moved to help the other woman, Vhetin turned to Floren and said, "There won't be anything to worry about, because you'll be right here with the rest of us."

The young lieutenant started and said, "Me? Why?"

"I need you in the security station on the third floor," Vhetin said, "keeping an eye on the feed from the holocams. You'll be our eyes and ears during the banuqet."

"But  _why_?" Floren looked very nervous at the possibility of being present if - or more likely _when_ \- Uruc attacked.

"Because there's going to be over a hundred guests," he said patiently. "Too many for even my HUD to keep track of. You'll need to watch everyone very carefully. If anything looks suspicious, just comm us and we'll investigate."

The young lieutenant nodded, gulping audibly. In the background, the shouting match between Brianna and the Sullustans had grown to an almost deafening volume, and Vhetin glanced at the thin rectangular window at the top of his HUD that showed his helmet's 360-degree vision. Jay had a hand on Brianna's arm, keeping her from pulling her pistol as the older huntress gestured angrily at the alien restaurant owners, her shouting sporadically mixed with words in Coruscant Underspeak, Huttese, and  _Mando'a_. It looked like Jay had the situation more or less under control, so Vhetin beckoned for the governor to follow him to a quieter area of the restaurant.

"While we were investigating," Vhetin murmured, almost too quiet to hear even to his own ears, "we also dug up an extra motive for Uruc."

"Oh?" Vonn said, raising an eyebrow. "And what would that be?"

"In a word: you."

The governor blinked, his face turning almost as white as his hair. "M-me?" he stammered. "Why me?"

Vhetin stared into the governor's terrified gaze unsympathetically, searching for signs that the old man was lying or holding back information. As far as he could tell, the Imperial was truly surprised by his words. After a moment Vhetin glanced around the room to ensure everyone was out of earshot, then murmured, "Tell me about your deployment on Jabiim."

"Jabiim?" Vonn said. "It... it was a typical year-long military rotation during the Clone Wars. It was a very hard planet to take; the Separatists were dug in, and we met resistance from the natives as well."

"Why didn't you tell us that you were stationed there?"

"I didn't think about it," the governor replied. "I... I thought it-"

"It just slipped your mind that Uruc was a member of the Jabiimi Resistance Movement while you were serving there? Did you pay attention to the natives whose lives you destroyed? Even just for security's sake?"

"There were hundreds of death threats every day, Mandalorian," Vonn said, sounding almost proud of the fact. "Far too many for even a platoon of stormtroopers to filter through for genuine threats. I had more important factors to consider than the random bullying of a madwoman, factors far from the concerns of the troops on the battlefield."

"So basically Jabiim was just a big battle you saw from space?" Vhetin asked, his lip curling in newfound disgust for the old man.

"Yes," Vonn said, drawing himself up to his full height. "I was in command of hundreds of platoons of troops and squadrons of starships, one of the most respected tacticians in the entire Jabiim battle theater. I was one of the leaders of-"

"I don't give a damn about how many troops you commanded," Vhetin snapped, clenching his fists in anger. This was  _typical_ ; he should have seen this coming. "You thought you could reduce a planet's surface to molten slag and just move on with no consequences? You self-centered  _hut'uun_!"

"Now there's no need for such-"

"You need to understand, Governor," he interrupted, "that Uruc isn't here to wear away at the Empire's infrastructure. The whole point of  _everything_  she's done since coming to Mon Cal has always been about  _you_. To kill  _you_. And right now I have half a mind to  _let_  her."

Vonn's white-haired eyebrows pulled down in a scowl. "If you allow her to kill me, you will lose your paycheck."

"Wrong," Vhetin said. "I've been privately contracted by Imperial Intelligence,  _shebs_ head, and the contract is for  _Uruc_. There are no penalties on my behalf for any loss of Imperial tech, materiel, or personnel. So I could just stand by and let Uruc fry your ass to hell and I.I won't bat an eyelash as long as I bring her in."

Vonn scowled deeper but said nothing, at a loss for what to say in return. Eventually, he simply turned on his heel and stormed away, hands clasped tightly behind his back. Vhetin stared after him, then turned to find Jay standing right behind him, staring at him. Caught up in his argument with the Governor, he hadn't even seen her approach through his helmet's 360-degree vision. He glared at her, even though the gaze was hidden behind his helmet. "What?"

She glanced after the governor, then said, "Would you really do that? Let Uruc kill him?"

"He certainly deserves it," he growled, stalking toward Brianna. She had apparently sorted out her argument with the restaurant owners, and had clambered back up the ladder and returned to her welding.

"I'm not disputing that," Jay said. "But I don't think it would be right to let Uruc shoot him. He's just a frail old man."

"I thought the whole reason you became a bounty hunter was to rid the galaxy of arrogant  _shabuire_  like him."

"He's just a  _frail_   _old_   _man_ ," Jay repeated forcefully. "I was thinking more along the lines of bastards like General Luun. You know, people who are  _under_   _sixty_."

"Justice should not be subjective to the guilty being's age," Vhetin said. "Evil comes in all forms, and even frail old men can be murderers. But a murderer who thinks it an honor, who’s _proud_ of the damage he’s caused.. _. ugh_. Makes me want to shoot him myself."

"What's up with you?" Jay asked, looking over at him. "Kassh was a murderer who reveled in killing people and you weren't this tense. What's wrong?"

"Tension, exhaustion, crankiness. Take your pick." He shook his helmeted head wearily. "Truthfully, it's all these damn Imperials. I can't stand them."

"I’m not too excited either. But we’ve got a job to do. The quicker we get it done, the quicker we get away from the Imps.”

Vhetin stepped up to the ladder and slapped one of the lower rungs. Brianna jumped, obviously thinking the Sullustan owners had come back for round two. When she saw Vhetin and Jay, however, she relaxed and pushed her welding goggles up her forehead.

"You almost ready?" Vhetin asked her. "The banquet's in three hours."

She slapped a palm against the durasteel, then hopped nimbly off the ladder and landed some five feet down on the floor.

"Yep," she said, brushing her hands off on her pants. "All we have to do is get the wallpaper up and we should be able to pass all this off. Uruc could attack this place with an army and not get through."

"And what about the security forces? Are they trustworthy?"

"Yeah," she nodded. "I ran a check through all their files, and everything clears. Except this one guy..."

"Which guy?"

"Oh no, you misunderstand. His file checked out as well, he's just kind of hard to understand."

"Why?" Jay asked, folding her arms across her chest. "Doesn't he speak Basic?"

Brianna shrugged. "Yeah, but only Old Basic for some reason. It's all _thee_ and _thou_ and _thy_ with him.”

“Charming.”

"In fact," she said, winking at Vhetin, "he's kind of cute, too. And he's probably a lot less moody than you are. I might just trade up."

Vhetin didn't let the jibe effect him. He just inclined his head slightly - a motion of irritation - and said, "A speech impediment is hardly a security problem."

She clapped him on the armored shoulder and grinned. "What's the matter, Stripes? Afraid of a little competition for my affection?"

When he didn’t reply, she raised her hands in surrender and said, "All right, calm down. I'm just messing with you."

"What's got you in such a good mood?" Jay asked. "In case you don't remember, we were almost killed by Uruc's hitmen, and it's almost a guarantee she's going to try and kill the governor."

Brianna grinned again, that same bright smile that was one of Vhetin's first, fondest memories of his time on Mandalore.

"This hunt is almost over," she said. "We’ve got Uruc in our sights and _she_ _’s_ coming to _us_. That should be enough to vault even  _Vhetin_  into a good mood."

"Apparently not," he said, turning away and heading for the kitchens. There were still a lot of staff members to look over, and the banquet was in three hours. "Just keep your focus, Bri. We're not out of this yet."


	9. Imperial Banquet

**Later**   **that**   **night**

Vhetin and Jay stood near the back of the main restaurant room, watching the crowd intently. Their preparations for the banquet were complete, and the drab durasteel plates on the walls had been covered with brilliantly-colored scarlet wallpaper and antique tapestries. Jay actually thought it looked better than it had before.

Soft, tranquil music wafted through the large central restaurant room that was hosting the banquet, coming from the direction of the orchestra stands that had been erected a few hours before the festivities had started. Jay had been nervous about the band at first; a large instrument case would be the perfect hiding place for bombs or blasters. But everyone in the band had checked out, having brought kloo horns and flixers and not crude IEDs or stolen E-11 rifles.

In the hour since the banquet had opened, the restaurant had quickly filled with hundreds of Imperials, ranging from mid-level officers to high-ranking officials and generals. It was the largest sign of life that Jay had seen since landing the morning before. Virtually all of Saiton City's inhabitants had evacuated, fleeing from the hurricane that was just now beginning to rage overhead. But it seemed that these pompous, arrogant Imperial officials had more guts than Jay had previously thought. They had ignored the threat of the storm to attend this banquet, the purpose of which was unknown to Jay.

She was forced to admit, however, that if she'd been nervous at the mere sight of stormtroopers before, she was downright  _terrified_  now. This many Imps... at least one of them was bound to know about the bounty on her head. Standing so blatantly in the open at a banquet like this, next to the Mandalorian who had broken her out, seemed to be asking for trouble.

Still, she tried to appear calm and collected, only partially because Vhetin had warned her not to give anything away that would alarm the banquet guests and possibly alert any of Uruc's infiltrators. She hooked her arms behind her back, unconsciously standing at attention like she used to in her piloting days, and watched the crowd carefully. After a few moments, she leaned closer to Vhetin and said, "Tall guy in dark blue, table sixteen. He keeps glancing around the room. Think he's looking for something?"

Vhetin stood as still as a permacrete pillar, hands linked behind his back as well. It looked as if he was ignoring her, but she guessed that he was consulting his HUD, reading vital information gathered from his helmet systems. "Hmm," he murmured after a moment. "Heart rate is elevated, he's sweating... something's wrong."

After a moment, however, a blond-haired woman in a revealing white dress stepped out of the crowd and sat near an officer at the head of the table the man occupied. She gave the man in blue a smile that lasted a little too long to be just a casual greeting. The man in dark blue smiled back, but quickly hid it when the officer who sat next to the woman - her husband presumably - looked his way.

"That's why he's so nervous," Vhetin said, nodding toward the man in blue. "His, ah, _extracurricular activities_ seem to be causing him anxiety."

Jay let out a quiet sigh and relaxed. So far, they had found no evidence of Uruc, and there was no sign yet that she was going to show herself at all. Vhetin tapped the comm signal booster mounted on the side of his helmet.

"Brianna," he said, "what've you got?"

Brianna had rented a dress from a nearby clothing store and was running security in plain clothing, blending into the crowd. She had insisted on it, even though Vhetin had pointed out that — since he rarely removed his helmet and next to no one knew what he looked like — he would be less likely to draw attention to himself. Jay still thought it was rather suspicious, and was pretty sure that Brianna had a viable reason for joining them on this hunt. So far, all she had supplied was that she had a score to settle with Uruc. Exactly what that meant, Jay had no idea.

There was a crackle of static over the small comm bead that Jay had hooked into one ear, then Brianna's voice said, " _Nothing yet. I'm keeping an eye out for Uruc but... well, this is a big crowd. I can't see everywhere at once._ "

"Just keep your area of the room secure," Vhetin said. "At least as secure as you can manage."

" _It's harder than it looks_ ," she replied darkly. " _I'm more worried about... oh kark it all._ "

"What?" Jay asked, glancing at Vhetin worriedly. Had Uruc shown herself? "What's wrong?"

" _It's that Pelano guy_ ," Brianna replied. " _Damn it, he's still got it in his head that I'm going to give him reports of our progress._ "

"Get him out of there," Vhetin said. "He'll blow your cover, and he could be Uruc's contact, remember?"

" _Calm down, Cin_ ," she said. " _It'll sell my cover even more if I'm with someone. A woman sitting alone and looking around the room in sporadic intervals is bound to be conspicuous._ "

"She's got a point," Jay admitted. "And she may be able to get some information out of him. Maybe get him to admit that he's the contact."

" _In the meantime, you two keep on your toes_ ," Brianna said. " _There's still a few hours until the end of the banquet. Uruc's window of opportunity is rapidly shrinking. If she_ _’s going to pull something, it’s going to be soon._ "

Vhetin nodded and turned his scrutiny back to the crowd. He was very tense; it was so obvious that Jay couldn't help but notice. She nudged him in the arm and said, "Hey. Don't worry. She knows what she's doing."

He nodded, hands almost clenched into fists as he spoke again. For a moment, Jay thought he was speaking to her, but then she realized he was talking over the comm.

"Be careful," he said quietly to Brianna.

There was a pause over the comm, then Brianna replied, " _I will._ "

~~~~~~~~

Brianna didn't even try to feign a surprised smile as Commander Pelano slid into the seat across from her and rested his palms on the tabletop. She frowned at him as he took her hand and kissed it gently.

"Miss Bellan," he said with a wide smile. "I didn't expect to find you here. May I say that you look  _lovely_."

Brianna had rented an elegant strapless gray dress for her plainclothes operation at the banquet. It wasn't expensive, but like everything associated with Imperials it was extravagant almost to a fault. It sparkled as she moved, drawing attention from people she passed, and the form-fitting garment left no room for concealed weapons. She had abandoned her normal tight braid and had instead allowed her long hair to hang loose over her shoulders in wavy arcs. She didn't particularly enjoy looking _lovely_ , as she preferred her high-collared jacket or her more revealing hunting gear to such frivolous clothing. But, not wanting to tip off a suspect for Uruc's contact, she bowed her head slightly and said, "Thank you. You look...  _striking_  yourself."

Pelano was wearing the exact same uniform clothing as the time she had first met him. The only difference was a small shoulder cape tossed over his right arm. His uniform was once again ironed down so the creases looked more like razor blades than cloth, and every hair on his head was perfectly parted down the middle.

"So..." he said with a prolonged sigh. He tapped the table with his palms a few times, then said, "Any luck on your hunt?"

"Any luck on yours?"

"Yes, actually.” Pelano smiled smugly. “I have tracked Uruc's spy to one of the staff of Imperial Command."

"Really?" Brianna said, narrowing her eyes.

"Oh yes," he said, nodding. "In fact, it's a good bet that the spy is here, at this very banquet."

Brianna sighed and shook her head quietly. This guy was all but openly admitting that he was on Uruc's payroll, in his own self-obsessed way. He was Vonn's second-in-command, after all, and a member of the IC staff. Maybe he really thought himself so important as to be untouchable?

"And what of your progress?"

"I'm not at liberty to say," she replied. "Like I said before, I'm working a private contract for Imperial Intelligence. That makes my hunt  _their_  business. Not yours."

"A pity," he said, looking truly remorseful. He sighed and stared at the tabletop.

 _Yeah, I_   _bet_   _you're_   _unhappy_ , she thought, staring at him.  _Now_   _you've_   _got_   _to_   _go_   _back_   _to_   _your_   _boss_   _and_   _tell_   _her_   _that_   _there are_   _three_   _bounty_   _hunters_   _at_   _the_   _banquet_   _as_   _well._

"So..." Brianna said, attempting to draw Pelano into conversation, "the spy could be somewhere at the banquet? Any idea who?"

Pelano laughed again and shook his head. "I'm not at liberty to say. You see,  _I_  am on private assignment by order of Governor Vonn. So any findings my investigation turns up do not need to be shared with I.I lackeys."

Brianna laughed for real; this was the first halfway intelligent conversation she'd had with the man since she'd met him. "Cute. Did you have a lowly pilot transcribe that line for you, or was that all your own material?"

Pelano just smiled and said, "You'll find I'm full of surprises."

"I'm serious, though," Brianna said, leaning forward and resting her forearms on the tabletop. "If you have the identity of Uruc's contact, you could tell me and lead me to Uruc that much faster. You can even take all the glory. All I want is Uruc behind bars."

"I'm sorry," he said as he shook his head. "Unfortunately, we don't have the contact's identity. He's very devious, always careful to cover his tracks. We have, however, turned up some... anomalies."

"Enlighten me."

"I told you-"

She flashed him her brightest, most attractive smile - a motion that was harder than it looked, given the amount of time she usually spent interrogating beings at blasterpoint - and said, "Come on. For business' sake."

Pelano debated with himself for a few moments, watching her as she twirled a strand of her hair between her fingers playfully, still smiling at him. Eventually, he sighed and said, "All right. But this is just between the two of us."

"Of course."

He glanced around himself, then leaned closer and murmured, "We found that the contact has been sending Uruc coded messages from a technician's keypad in one of the sublevels of Imperial Command. Apparently he thought that the sheer number of ingoing and outgoing messages from the terminal would blanket his transmissions, burying them. He was wrong."

"What did the messages say?" she asked, genuinely interested.

"We don't know. The code is unlike any we've seen before. We think it's a variation of an ancient Jabiimi battle code, used for communication between allied ancient tribal chieftains before battle. After the banquet began, such communications increased twofold."

That didn't sound good, but it wasn't anything Brianna hadn't suspected already. All the evidence they'd found so far showed that Uruc's organization was mobilizing, getting ready to hit the banquet. This just strengthened that theory.

"Anything else?"

He hesitated, then said, "The contact has also been supplying information through that terminal; troop movements, building schematics, anything he can get his hands on. The blueprints for Imperial Garrison Command were among these plans."

"How is that surprising?"

"Those plans are highly guarded. No mid-ranking official could get access to them without authorization. And they were all signed out by a single high-ranking officer. In fact—"

Suddenly, applause rang through the room as Governor Vonn stood from his table and stepped up to a podium at the head of the room, a glass full of a dark green liquid in one hand.

"Ah," Pelano said. "The governor's speech. We can continue our discussion afterward."

"No, no.” She glanced at the governor, then back to Pelano. “I'm interested now. Who was this officer?"

But the Governor's voice boomed through the vocal amplifier mounted to the podium now, drowning out her words. She sighed and turned her attention to him as he raised his glass and began his speech.

"My friends, associates, and fellow officers," he said with a wide smile. "I thank you all for coming, and braving this vicious storm -"

He gestured to the raging wind and rain outside the windows, the roar of the thunder outside muffled by the building's walls. It was almost noon, yet the clouds blocked the sun outside, making it look as dark as midnight. A brilliant blue-white fork of lightning struck somewhere in the city, accompanied by a deafening clap of thunder.

"- to join us in celebration," Vonn continued as the rumble died down, turning back to the crowd. "As you know, our lovely Saiton City was founded on this day, exactly one hundred years ago. Back in those days, the city was nothing but a trading post, floating upon the ever-ocean of Mon Calamari, lost in the waves. And since the Empire took Saiton under her wing, we have grown into one of the greatest, most beautiful cities in the entire galaxy."

Brianna listened with half an ear, keeping a watchful gaze on Pelano. Was he deliberately leading her on, dangling a name in front of her like a hydro-mushroom in front of an obedient nerf? As far as she could tell, he was just watching the Governor with undivided attention.

"Seriously," she murmured. "What was the name of the officer?"

Pelano glanced at her, then waved his hand dismissively and said, "Oh, just some general named Retiard. He's been detained for questioning."

 _Retiard_... that name sounded familiar. Brianna frowned as she stared at the tabletop, searching her mind for anything to point her in the right direction.  _Retiard... Retiard... where_   _have_   _I_   _heard_   _that_   _name?_

Vonn raised his glass with another smile and said, "We could not have made it without the strength, perseverance, and determination of all of Saiton's loyal Imperial servants. And so, I offer this toast: to Saiton!"

"To Saiton!" the banquet guests chorused, raising their glasses as one and drinking to the toast. Vonn drank to the toast as well, then raised his glass again.

"To Mon Calamari!"

"To Mon Calamari!" came the echo from the crowd.

Out of curiosity, Brianna pulled her datapad from a small purse she had brought with her and keyed through some files. She paused at one in particular, carefully reading through it.

Vonn drank again, swallowing with some difficulty and grimacing at the strong taste of his drink before raising his glass again and saying, "To the Empire!"

"To the Empire!" the crowd called.

Vonn took a last drink, then set the drink aside, gently massaging his throat. "And now I turn the evening's festivities back to Fell Talenian and his wonderful band. Once more, I must..." He coughed slightly, "I must thank all of you..."

He coughed again, grimacing as he rubbed his throat harder. "I'm s-sorry," he stammered, very pale all of a sudden. "I seem to have something caught in my throat..."

Brianna reached the end of the file and her eyes widened in horror.  _The_   _contact,_ she thought to herself.  _How_   _could_   _I have_   _been_   _so_  stupid  _to_   _trust_   _him?_ She stood from the table, but was far too late to intervene.

The governor collapsed off the edge of podium and crumpled to the floor. Moments later, all hell broke loose. No sooner had screams begun to echo through the restaurant room than all the doors blew off their hinges , filling the room with smoke and debris. Black-armored beings wearing hellish masks stormed through the smoke and smog, blasters in their hands. The stormtrooper guard - both the armored and plainclothes soldiers - immediately sprang into action, drawing weapons and charging at the attackers.

"No!" Brianna shouted at the troopers as guests began panicking and running in all directions. "No, remember what I told you! Don't take them head-on!"

Still too late. The black-clothed intruders opened fire, mowing down troopers and guests alike with a spray of blaster fire. Screams rang through the restaurant as white-armored troopers fell to the ground in a clatter of armor plates. The attackers nudged the bodies with their toes, then stepped over them, aiming their weapons into the crowd and shouting for everyone to freeze and get on the ground.

"Damn it!" Brianna shouted, and spun back to her table. Pelano had disappeared to Force-knew-where, but she barely cared. She just grabbed for her datapad and the purse that held her comlink and her pistols. She debated which to grab first, then decided on the comlink.

She frantically keyed in a code. "Cin! Where are you?"

Then another black-clad figure strode through the door, flanked by a purple-skinned Twi'lek and a towering, hairy Wookiee. The Wookiee roared and clapped his huge hands together in anticipation as Jolee Uruc drew her pistol and fired twice into the air. Unlike the shots from the thirteen intruders before, these two blaster shots drew everyone's attention. With wide eyes, the banquet guests turned to Uruc, many of them whimpering in fear.

There was silence for a few moments as Uruc surveyed her new captives.

"Ladies and gentlemen," she finally said, surveying the crowd with a scowl. "This party is officially over. Stay on the ground, stay  _quiet_ , and my associates and I will try to make this evening as quick and painless as possible."


	10. Dinner is Ruined

Jay could barely believe it when Governor Vonn pitched over the side of the podium, crumpling into a heap at the bottom of the stage. She jumped, startled out of her shock, as guests began screaming and moving to stand from their seats. They didn't make it far. Moments later the doors were blown inward, falling to the ground with loud crashes, smoke wafting into the room from the breach charges.

"Down!" Vhetin shouted, putting a hand on Jay's shoulder and shoving her to the ground as blaster fire slashed through the air above their heads. Jay covered her head, risking a glance up at the breached doors. Emerging from the smoke were masked intruders wearing black armor and holding standard-issue Imperial blasters. They fired into the crowd, taking out the stormtrooper guards that dared to charge them.

"Come on," Vhetin said, kneeling and pulling a pistol from a holster on his belt. "We have to get to Vonn."

"What the hell happened?" she asked as they made their way in a crouched run for the podium, pushing their way through the panicking crowd. "Uruc wasn't supposed to attack from the  _inside_!"

"She outsmarted us," Vhetin growled, shoving aside a screaming Rodian waiter. "Let us waste our time hardening defenses against an  _exterior_  assault while we should have focused our attention elsewhere."

They finally reached the podium, which had been knocked over by the panicking guests. Vonn's crumpled, limp form lay next to it, unmoving. Vhetin checked his pulse quickly, then shook his helmeted head.

"Dead.”

"How?" Jay asked, wincing as three staccato blaster shots rang through the room, quickly followed by terrified wails.

Vhetin dabbed some of the Governor's spilled drink onto his gloved fingertips, then tapped them against a readout on his gauntlet. He stared at it for a moment, then nodded.

"Floroxide," he said as the chemical analysis came back. "Imperial-produced neurotoxin that's extremely lethal to humans when mixed with alcohol. Makes sense; Imperial Commandos have been using it for assassinations for years."

"She poisoned him? Why didn't we expect that?"

He shook his head in disgust and said, "Again, she had our attention focused on an all-out attack. She's never displayed this kind of subtlety before. She must have been saving this plan, biding her time for years."

Suddenly, two deafening blaster shots rang through the room, and everything went silent. Jay heard a woman's voice call, "Ladies and gentlemen, this party is officially over. Stay on the ground, stay quiet, and my associates and I will try to make this evening as quick and painless as possible."

"Uh-oh," she whispered, risking a quick peek over a tabletop. "That sounds like Uruc."

Vhetin stared in the same direction, his helmet's flag-like rangefinder sliding down to eye-level with a quiet mechanical buzz. He surveyed the woman, who was guarded by a Twi'lek and a massive black-furred Wookiee, and nodded. "Yeah, that's her. Facial recognition confirms it."

"So what are you waiting for?" she said, gesturing at his helmet and the comm equipment she knew was housed inside. "Call law enforcement. Get them to block off this area and-"

"No good.” He shook his head. “This is a hostage situation, and if she gets a single glimpse of the local security force, she's going to kill everyone here."

"She doesn't intend to let anyone go anyway!"

"But if we play our cards right," he said, putting his pistol away, "we might be able to capture her and her thugs with minimal casualties."

"What are you suggesting?"

"Right now?" he shook his head. "We'll have to split up. You stay here, keep quiet, and do whatever they tell you. If you disobey, that just gives them more reason to shoot you."

"What about you?" she asked, staring at Uruc over the table. "You kind of stand out in a crowd. Mandalorians aren't exactly your typical Imperial citizen."

When he didn't answer, she looked over and said, "Vhetin?"

But he had disappeared. All she saw was his empty helmet, resting on the floor next to her and his armored flak vest and jetpack a few feet beyond that.

Vhetin had apparently decided to go plainclothes, as he’d originally planned. It was a sound strategy; since no one present knew his real identity, he could effortlessly blend in with the crowd and strike when they least expected it. It wasn’t much of an advantage, but it was something. She wished her partner good luck as she gathered up his fallen armor and tucked it underneath the podium for him to retrieve later.

But there was still a pretty major problem. In a room full of Imperial officers clothed in sharp-looking uniforms and elegant-looking dresses, a woman with pistol and an armorleather jacket also stood out. She'd have to find a way to blend in better as well.

So, as Uruc and her thugs began to comb through the crowd, ordering their captives to hand over any comm devices or weapons - as well as any valuables while they were at it - Jay crept through the crowd and into a side passage. She froze and pressed up against a wall as she saw another of Uruc's thugs guarding the hall outside the main banquet room. As soon as the being had his back turned, she ducked across the hall and through the door into a fresher. She silently closed the door behind her and let out a long breath.

The fresher room was almost eerily silent compared to the pandemonium of the main restaurant room. All Jay could hear was the quiet hum of the electron lights above the washbasins.

 _Okay,_ she thought, shaking her head to clear it.  _Stay_   _focused. Think_   _of_   _something. You've_   _got_   _to_   _find_   _some_   _way_   _to_   _draw less_   _attention_   _to_   _yourself. Some_   _way_   _to_   _blend_   _in, just_   _like_   _Vhetin_   _and Brianna did._

But ballroom dresses couldn't exactly be found in any old utility closet and without her jacket, she had no other clothes than her simple rough-material combat pants and a cloth tank top. Not exactly standard dress for an Imperial banquet.

There may be other options, however...

She saw a side door leading to an employee's fresher, reserved for staff of the restaurant. She pushed through it quietly, her eyes roving all of the small room beyond. She let out a relieved breath as she saw a rack of waitress uniforms near one wall, stored so the fresher doubled as a changing room while the banquet was taking place.

Simple garments that were easy to overlook compared to some of the getups the Imperial guests were wearing, the uniforms consisted of a light blue blouse and skirt and moderately uncomfortable-looking shoes of the same color. They weren't exactly what someone would want to be wearing while taken hostage, seeing as how they offered nothing close to the protection her blaster-resistant jacket presented, but they were relatively inconspicuous and that served her purposes quite well.

 _Thank_   _you,_ she thought as she rummaged through them, looking for a size that fit her.  _Thank_   _you, thank_   _you. This_   _is just_   _what_   _I_   _was_   _looking_   _for._

As she pulled a uniform off the rack and slid off the plastisheet covering, she activated her ear-mounted comlink and whispered, "Floren. Floren, you there?"

" _Thank the Emperor,_ " came the young lieutenant's voice. He was stationed in the barricaded security outpost two floors up, monitoring the security cam feeds for anything suspicious, so he could warn the hunters before Uruc had a chance to pull anything. So far, thought, he had failed his job miserably. " _You're alive_."

"For the moment," Jay said, glancing over her shoulder, wary of anyone following her. The guard must not have heard her enter the fresher, so she was clear for now.

" _Uruc's guards have taken the guests hostage!_ " Floren said, fear evident in his voice. " _And the Governor is_ _… I think he may be dead!_ "

She rolled her eyes, pulling off her jacket and tossing it in one corner. After a few moments, her belt, pistol, and holster followed it. She didn't want Uruc's Warriors to find a weapon on her. If they did, the consequences would be... severe.

"What's going on in there?" she asked him.

There was a pause over the comm, then he reported, " _Uruc's Warriors are rounding up the guests into the center of the room. There are several guests who are wounded..._ " He gulped and added, " _Several are dead._ "

That wasn't good. Any hope of melting back into the crowd as easily as she had left was now gone. She'd have to find a way around that.

"What about Vhetin or Brianna?" she asked, pulling her undershirt over her head and replacing it with the light blue uniform blouse. "Can you see either of them?"

" _No_ ," came the quick response. " _There are over a hundred guests. It's very difficult to pick out one from the other._ ”

Finally, some good news. With so many guests, very few of them would stand out from the other. Jay hoped she would not be among those who were easily recognizable.

" _W-what should I do?_ " Floren asked nervously. She could hear the sound of keys clacking in the background of his transmission.

"Keep an eye on the situation and keep me informed on what's going on," Jay said, tossing aside her pants and stepping into the uniform skirt. "If Uruc or her thugs do something, I want to know about it."

" _What if they come up to the third floor?_ " he asked. " _Force save me, what if they try and get into the security station?_ "

"The doors of that place are over a meter thick of reinforced durasteel," she reassured him. "We reinforced them this afternoon, remember? It would take hours for even a lightsaber to cut through there."

" _They might have that much time._ "

She sighed as she tied her hair up into a bun similar to the kind she'd seen waitresses use. "Then we'll worry about that eventuality when we come to it. In the meantime, keep an eye out up there and keep me posted. Moqena out."

She examined herself in the mirror, making sure her disguise was complete. She now looked almost exactly like one of the restaurant's many waitresses, and would surely draw little attention to herself. That still didn’t exactly make her plan any less frightening, and she couldn't exactly sneak back  _into_  the restaurant room. By now, Uruc's Warriors would have secured the doors, so there was only one alternative.

Her heart was pounding as she stepped back into the normal fresher. She took a deep breath and thought, _Oh, this is a terrible idea_ _…_ Then she slammed the door open and stormed out into the hall beyond, cursing. As soon as she emerged into the hall, the black-armored guard spun and leveled his blaster at her.

"Who are you?" he snapped. "What're you doing?"

"My name is Leeli," she shot back with a glare. "And I'll tell you what the hell I'm doing: I'm going to go in that restaurant and give that bastard Poll a piece of my mind. I don't care if I have to karking shoot him in front of the entire karking  _restaurant_! He thinks he can cheat on me with that damn Twi'lek? I don't think-"

The man stepped forward and racked back the charging rod on the blaster, aiming the weapon at her forehead and growling, "No. You're coming with me."

The fear that showed on Jay's face was real, but she was lying through her teeth as she raised her hands and said, "Look, mister, I don't want any trouble. I just want-"

The guard interrupted her again and gestured with the rifle. "Move it, down the hall. And don't try anything funny."

She nodded quickly, hands still in the air, and moved down the hall, throwing sporadic fearful glances over her shoulder. "A-are you with security?" she stammered after a few long moments, trying to sell her cover story. "I wasn't really going to shoot Poll."

"Shut up," the guard growled. "Just walk."

She was led down the hall that surrounded the central restaurant room, lush red carpeting underfoot and extravagant paintings on the walls. The guard pressed the barrel of his rifle uncomfortably into the small of her back, but she continued to play the part of the innocent waitress.

"I-I don't want any t-trouble," she stammered as she forced her hands to tremble. It wasn’t difficult. "I just want-"

The guard shoved her around a corner, to a waiting group of black-armored thugs who were hauling a large durasteel crate through the front doors. Jay paused, staring at it for a moment.

 _That's_   _not_   _good_ , she thought.  _That_   _has_   _to_   _be_   _the_   _hydro-conversion_   _bomb_.  _I_   _have_   _to_   _warn_   _Vhetin_   _or_   _Brianna_.

Then the guard shoved her in the back again, towards the troopers.

"What've you got there?" one of them said as he looked up. Jay saw eerily sparkling violet eyes through the slits in the man's black facemask, and she shuddered.

"Some dumb waitress who wasn't on duty when we took the central room," Jay's guard growled. "I'm taking her back to the main group."

The violet-eyed thug stepped forward and squeezed Jay's face in his hand. He turned her head side to side, studying her with narrowed eyes. "I don't know," he said. "I think you should keep her. She's a pretty one."

Jay felt real fear now. Becoming a plaything for Uruc's terrorists wasn't part of her plan. Luckily, her guard shook his masked head and said, "Uruc's orders. No taking prisoners for ourselves, remember?"

The violet-eyed thug sighed and released Jay's face, stepping back up to the crate. "Yeah," he grumbled as Jay sighed quietly in relief. "That's stupid. There's only like a fifty-fifty chance any of us are goin' to live through all this, so why can't we go out having some fun?"

"Orders," the guard repeated, prodding Jay in the back again and leading her away from the rest of the terrorists.

As she was led away, she heard the violet-eyed guard bark, "Move it you worthless  _schutta_ s! The boss wants this crate down in the basement as soon as possible!"

 _Gotcha_ , she thought as she was led away.  _I've_   _got_   _a_   _location_   _now. I_   _just_   _need_   _to_   _pass_   _it_   _on_   _to_   _someone_   _who_   _can_   _get_   _in there_   _and_   _disable_   _the_   _bomb. If_   _only_   _I_   _knew_   _where_   _Vhetin_   _or_   _Brianna_   _are_   _hiding_   _out..._

Her guard guided her through a pair of double-doors at the head of the hall, back into the main restaurant room. She stumbled slightly as he shoved her ahead of him, but regained her balance with difficulty. She had no idea how the restaurant staff walked around all day in these damn shoes, but it was selling her cover as the insignificant waitress, so she didn't mind too much.

The situation inside the center was much as Floren had told her: the hundreds of guests had been herded into a crowd near the center of the room, some held at tables and talking quietly among each other or crying to themselves, while others sat on the floor sporting various expressions of anger or fear. Uruc's guards were prowling the perimeter of the group, occasionally kicking at their prisoners or brandishing their weapons.

Uruc was standing near the front doors to the room, consulting a holographic readout that sprang from her single mechanical arm. She was still joined by the huge Wookiee and the purple-skinned Twi'lek, and was speaking with them in hushed tones. They turned as they heard approaching footsteps.

The Wookiee barked slightly and Uruc raised an eyebrow as she surveyed Jay and the guard. She folded her arms across her chest and tapped her foot.

"What's the meaning of this?" she asked the guard.

"Caught this waitress in the fresher, ma'am," the guard replied. "She wasn't with the main group when we stormed the central room."

Uruc turned to Jay and frowned. "What were you doing in there? Planning to call law enforcement?"

"N-no," she whimpered. "I... I had just learned that my boyfriend was cheating-"

"I don’t care," Uruc said, raising her mechanical hand for silence. "Just shut up and get with the rest of the group."

The guard led her toward the rest of the hostages, then planted a boot in her back and kicked her into the crowd. She cried out in surprise as she crashed into a table and fell to the floor in a clatter of dishes and silverware. She was quickly helped up by the rest of the hostages, who repeatedly asked if she was all right. She nodded and shook hair out of her face as she said, "I'm fine. I'm fine."

She cast one last glance over her shoulder, at the rest of the guards, and made sure no one was watching her as she slipped into the crowd.

 _I_   _need_   _to_   _find_   _Vhetin_   _or_   _Brianna,_ she thought.  _And_   _warn_   _them_   _about_   _the_   _bomb._

She activated her comm and whispered, "Floren. Floren, where are you?"

" _I'm here_ ," came the response. " _What's wrong?_ "

"Are you karking  _blind_  up there?" she demanded. "Why didn't you warn me that Uruc's thugs are bringing the bomb into the building?"

" _They are?_ " Floren sounded genuinely surprised. " _I had no idea!_ "

"Why not?"

" _They're covering the security cams as they travel through the restaurant_ ," he replied. " _They have blocked almost all of them, save for the Mandalorian_ _’s hidden cams._ "

"And where are those?"

There was a pause, then Floren replied, " _There are four of them: one hidden in the kitchens, one in the maintenance room on the second floor, one outside the security station, and one hidden in the ventilation shaft above the central room where the hostages are being held._ "

Jay looked up at the large durasteel ventilation shaft, then said, "Do Vhetin or Brianna have their comms activated?"

" _I'm getting no reading from either_ ," Floren replied. " _I do not know why._ "

She cursed under her breath. "Can you see either of them?"

" _I can tell you the location of Miss Bellan, if that would help-_ "

"It would," Jay replied. She had to warn someone about the bomb, and soon. She looked up at the ventilation shaft and waved, careful not to make the motion noticeable to any guards who would be watching.

"Do you see me?" she asked.

There was a long pause, then Floren said, " _Yes. I can pick you out from the crowd. Why are you dressed as one of the waitresses?_ "

"Long story," she said. "Just lead me to Brianna."

" _As you wish_ ," he replied.

As Floren guided her through the crowd, Jay didn't have the slightest idea how any of them were going to make it out of this alive. She hoped Vhetin was having better luck doing whatever it was he had planned.

~~~~~~~~

Vhetin currently didn't have a plan as he crept down one of the dark hallways on the second floor, which was almost entirely reserved for the kitchens. The power had been shut down to this floor when Uruc and her Warriors had entered the building, and it looked like the cooks and the few undercover security forces had been the first to be taken hostage. Bodies were strewn across the floor or sprawled across counter tops. It wasn't a pretty scene.

Vhetin had been forced to leave his armor behind in the restaurant for the sake of subtlety, and he was missing his HUD systems with every second. He unintentionally kept glancing towards the top left corner of his vision, where he would usually find his motion tracker.

He felt naked and blind without his  _beskar'gam_ , but he had done plainclothes ops before. He was out of his comfort zone, but far from helpless. Thankfully, he had brought a pistol and one of his lightsabers with him, so he wasn't completely defenseless as well. He still looked like a wayward hostage, though, and that wasn't good at all. He needed a disguise, something that would let him travel uninterrupted throughout the building. Maybe...

Something clanked behind him, sounding suspiciously like a footfall, and he spun, leveling his pistol. He saw a dark form standing behind him and he jumped forward without thought, throwing a shoulder into the being's chest and driving it back against a supply closet. However, his shoulder didn't catch armor or unprotected flesh, instead slamming violently against hard metallic plating.

With a cry of surprise, a black-and-silver masculine protocol droid staggered back and crashed against a cabinet, arms flailing.

"Oh my!" the droid said as it sprawled on its back and struggled to right itself. "What in the name of the Empire are you doing?"

Vhetin glanced up and down the hall, making sure no one had heard the commotion, then hauled the heavy droid to its feet.

"Sorry," he said. "I thought you were... someone else."

"Undoubtedly you believed I was one of the  _intruders_ ," the droid said, its vocoder inflection making it sound surprisingly sullen. "I cannot say as I am surprised. You are, after all, only organic and therefore prone to such mistakes."

Vhetin glared at the droid and said, "Stow the backtalk. Why are you still wandering around up here?"

"The intruders allowed me to go free after some... roughhousing," the droid explained, stepping into the flickering light of a glowlamp and showing him several dents and scratches on its black-painted attendant casing. This droid was one of the restaurant staff. "It will take  _weeks_  to get all these imperfections from my person. I won't be able to walk straight for-"

"Enough," Vhetin interrupted. "Did you manage to hear anything from Uruc's thugs while you were there? Did they say anything?"

"They said many things, organic," the droid replied, fixing him with a blank stare from its round photoreceptors. "I hardly think-"

"Anything about the hostages?"

"No."

"Anything about a bomb? A hydro-conversion bomb?"

"No."

Vhetin sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Okay... What's your name? Your designation?"

"TX-22. The cooks refer to me as _Tex_ ," the droid said. "A deplorable name, even by organic standards, but-"

Vhetin ignored the droid's ramblings and turned away, activating the hands-free comm bead he had taken with him. He had kept it switched off for the last few minutes, as he needed his concentration and he couldn't risk any nearby guards overhearing the transmission. Here, on the deserted second floor, there wasn't much chance of that.

"Brianna," he said into the comm. "Jay. Do either of you read me?"

" _Jay here_ ," came the almost instantaneous response. " _Where the hell have you been_?"

"I've been busy," he replied. "I managed to sneak out of the main restaurant room. I'm up on the second floor."

" _Thank the Emperor_ ," she sighed in relief, apparently forgetting her hatred of the Empire for a moment. " _I have really important news._ "

"What?"

" _It's a long story, but I managed to get into a disguise and had one of the guards escort me back into the restaurant room. While he was taking me back, I saw the other thugs bringing a big durasteel crate into the building. Three guesses what's inside._ "

"The hydro-conversion bomb," Vhetin muttered. "Great. Did you hear where they were taking it?"

" _The guy who was in charge just said to bring it to the basement. Not sure beyond that. Sorry Stripes._ "

"That's all right, we still have time," he said. "Maybe."

" _Do you think you can find it in time and... I don't know, defuse it?_ "

Vhetin glanced at the protocol droid, a thoughtful frown crossing his face. "Yeah... I think I might be able to."

" _Okay_ ," Jay said with a relieved sigh. " _Good luck. Jay out_."

Vhetin switched off the comm, then turned to the protocol droid, who was staring at him expectantly.

"Tex," he said slowly, "can you track the comm channels of Uruc's soldiers and see where they're taking a piece of cargo? A crate?"

"The intruders?" the droid's photoreceptors flashed, making it look as if it was blinking. "I can... but what would-"

"These intruders are going to set off a bomb that'll kill everyone in this city if I don't stop them," Vhetin said tersely. "So I need to find this bomb to defuse it."

"Oh," the droid said. It paused, then said, " _Oh_. Why, yes. I believe I can track this bomb with ease."

"Good," Vhetin said. He turned away, activating a different secure channel.

"Floren," he said, "come in."

" _Here_ ," came the officer's reply.

"Track any security cams that show a group of soldiers hauling a big durasteel crate. When they stop and start unpacking the crate, I need you to tell me where they are."

" _I can do that_ ," Floren said.

"Excuse me," Tex said, sounding moderately indignant. "But I was under the impression that you just tasked  _me_  with that job."

"I need a backup plan," Vhetin explained quickly as he once again shut down the comm unit. "Something that'll allow me to increase my chances of finding it."

"Oh."

He gestured to the hall ahead of them and said, "So go ahead. Lead on."

Tex's glowing photoreceptors dimmed for a moment as it pulled power to a different function, then it jerked like a human when slapped and gestured down a side hall and said, "The intruders with this bomb are two levels down, in sub-basement one. I will lead you to their location."

Vhetin took a deep breath, flexed his fingers over the grip of his blaster, then followed the droid into the dark hall.


	11. Hunters to Hostages

Jay was still making her way towards Brianna when Uruc's voice rang through the room once more. Everyone - herself included - froze and listened intently to the woman lest they be blasted on the spot.

"Attention, ladies and gentlemen," Uruc said, raising her hands to draw attention to herself. She still held her blaster pistol in one hand, and Jay watched it closely in case Uruc was in the mood for some slaughter like she had wreaked at Imperial Garrison Command. The slightest twitch of the woman's mechanical trigger finger, and Jay would know to dive for cover. She hoped the other hostages were as attentive as she was.

"It has come to my attention," Uruc announced, "that there are several bounty hunters present as part of a security detail for the banquet."

Jay's blood ran cold, and she resisted the urge to gasp in horror. She should have known that it was only a matter of time before Uruc or her thugs traced through the security holofeeds and noticed that there was a Mandalorian present, but how did she know about Jay or Brianna? Apart from their attire, which they had long since changed for greater stealth, there was nothing that set them apart from other hostages.

Uruc surveyed the hostages with her dark eyes full of fury, then said, "Fine. You don't feel like talking?"

She leveled her pistol at the nearest hostage and pulled the trigger three times. The victim - a blonde-haired Imperial in a dark green suit - crumpled to the ground without a sound as screams rang through the room. The huge black-furred Wookiee roared deafeningly, and the screams instantly died down.

Uruc's dark gaze raked through the crowd, like a spotlight over a prison compound. Jay could swear her heart skipped a beat as the woman's gaze passed her. But Uruc didn't recognize her, and she kept looking through the crowd.

"Whoever you are," she said, "show yourself, or another hostage dies."

Jay didn't move; giving herself up now was stupid, and Uruc probably wouldn't risk losing another potential ransom.

When no one else in the group stood up either, Uruc scowled and raised the pistol again, aiming it now at a cowering woman in a torn black dress. As her finger tightened on the trigger, Jay tensed, readying to stand. Stupid or not, she wasn't going to let another innocent person die because of her.

But before she could do anything, another voice shouted, "Stop!"

Jay froze as she recognized the voice, and looked over as someone stood from the crowd only a few feet from her.

It was Brianna. She was staring at Uruc with fury as she picked her way around hostages and made her way to the front of the group.

Uruc's eyes were wide as the banquet serving plates as Brianna stood in front of her, putting her hands on her hips.

"This has gone on long enough," she said.

In the blink of an eye, Uruc's pistol was aimed at Brianna, and she squeezed the trigger once. A bright red bolt seared through the air, and Brianna screamed, falling to her knees and holding her stomach. Uruc followed up with a swift kick in the face, sending Brianna sprawling onto her back.

But Brianna still had one surprise left. As she flipped onto her back, two pistols emerged from the purse at her side, and she pointed them directly at Uruc's head. Within only moments, every one of Uruc's Warriors had their weapons pointed at Brianna's head; even the Wookiee had drawn a massive bowcaster.

"Put... the gun...  _down_." Brianna didn't seem to even notice the blasters aimed at her. She panted, blood staining the stomach of her dress, as she tightened her grip on the triggers of her weapons..

Uruc stared at the barrel of the pistol for a long time. Then she laughed, a long, smooth sound that belied the woman's ferocity.

"You won't shoot me," Uruc chuckled, stepping back and aiming her own blaster at the cowering woman again. "I hold all the cards. Put your own guns down."

Brianna faltered, her aim shaking slightly as she glanced between the cowering woman and the weapons pointed at her head. Then she sighed and tossed her weapons away, wincing and holding her bleeding stomach as two of the Warriors stepped forward. They hauled Brianna to her feet and pulled her up toward Uruc.

The woman stepped close to Brianna, studying her with a cocked head. She smiled again and said, "So... you were the one who took my contract. I was wondering who I would be saddled with. You know, Fett would have just shot me."

"Fett... wouldn't have been able... to hide from your idiot Warriors for so long," Brianna panted.

Uruc pistol-whipped Brianna across the face, making the other woman cry out in pain and hang limp in the grip of the Warriors who held her. Uruc gestured to the group, and the Warriors tossed the unconscious woman back to the hostages. They shrunk away from her as Uruc stepped forward, looking down at her.

"I never thought I'd see you again," she murmured, holstering her pistol. "I should kill you right now."

Jay tensed, readying to attack Uruc if the terrorist dared to pull her pistol again. The dark-skinned woman was well within reach; all it would take was a quick punch to the throat, maybe a slash from a piece of broken silverware...

However, Uruc stepped back and said, "But I guess you'll all die soon enough. It's not worth the effort."

Then she turned and strode away, leaving the hostages to cower and whimper under the ruthless gazes of her Warriors.

Jay stared at Brianna, then nudged a man sitting next to her. "Bring her into the group," she murmured. "She needs medical help."

The man nodded and murmured the same to a few people nearby. Together, the hostages pulled Brianna deeper into the crowd, where Uruc and her Warriors wouldn't be able to get at her.

Jay followed the procession, watching from a safe distance until she was satisfied that they were away from the prying eyes of their captors. Then she knelt next to Brianna and examined the wound.

Brianna coughed and her eyes fluttered open. She saw Jay kneeling next to her and sighed.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Jay murmured as she grabbed a tablecloth from the ground next to her, shook it out, and pressed it against the bleeding wound on the other huntress' stomach. "She could have killed you."

Brianna chuckled dryly, then winced as Jay put pressure on the wound. "I couldn't let her kill someone else. I had no choice. What would you have done?"

"The same," Jay replied instantly. "But getting yourself killed isn't going to help these people, either."

Brianna said nothing to that, just closed her eyes and took a deep breath as Jay examined her wound.

"You're lucky," Jay said. "The bolt only grazed your ribcage; you should be good as new in a day or so if you give it time to heal."

"Where's Cin?" she asked suddenly, looking over at Jay worriedly. "Is he-"

"He's fine," Jay reassured her. "He ditched his armor and disappeared. Last I talked to him, he's up on the second floor."

"I need to talk to him," Brianna said, trying to push herself up. " _Now_."

"Calm down," Jay said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "You need to rest. If you're worried about the hydro-conversion bomb, he's on his way to defuse it right now. We're on top of the situation."

"No," Brianna said. "Uruc's mole! I know who it is! We need to warn him!"

Jay stared at Brianna for a long moment, uncomprehending, then nodded. "Okay. I'll see if I can get him on comms."

Brianna collapsed back onto the floor, her eyes closing in exhaustion. She took a deep breath and murmured, "Hurry."

 

"Are you any closer, Tex?" Vhetin murmured, covering the hall behind them with his pistol. "We're not going to be able to sneak around here forever."

"I am tracking their comlink transmissions within an accuracy of two meters," the droid said matter-of-factly. "I cannot function any better than this. If you would prefer to chase after these intruders yourself, then I would by happy to-"

"All right, all right," Vhetin relented. "Just hurry."

"Of course," the droid said, shuffling down the red-carpeted hallway. "Under normal circumstances, I would be pointing out the different features of this restaurant, like our collection of rare Corellian paintings, imported directly from Coronet City, and our grade-thirteen Mon Calamari architecture-"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it," Vhetin growled. "Just... try to concentrate."

"My central computer core allows for over fifty percent more processing power than an organic brain," Tex said. "More than enough to divide my consciousness between monitoring comm channels and this rather pointless conversation with you."

"For a protocol droid," Vhetin said as patiently as he could, teeth clenched, "you sure have an attitude."

"I am a waiter," the droid said, a definite note of condescension in his voice, "and therefore come in contact with many rude and disorderly organics. I would assume that some of that has rubbed off on-"

Both Vhetin and the droid froze as they turned a corner and ran almost headlong into a black-armored Warrior; Vhetin saw that it was a tall Quarren female with a long-barreled sniper rifle strapped across her back. Vhetin didn't have time to reach for his weapon before the Qarren had raised her smaller blaster rifle and sighted in on him.

He ducked out of the way just as the Quarren fired. The bright red blaster bolt flashed past his shoulder, impacting against the wall behind him and exploding with a loud  _pow._

The Quarren female grunted, her facial tentacles flailing as Vhetin tackled her around the waist, driving them both to the floor. Vhetin recovered first, drawing his lightsaber and pressing the emitter against the Quarren's armpit.

"Don't struggle," he grunted, holding the Warrior down with a knee on her chest and a hand against her throat. "I know you can understand me, so listen up: this blade is pointed straight at your heart. All I have to do is press the activation stud, and you're nothing but a smoking carcass for the hawkbats to pick over."

The Quarren grunted something in her own guttural language, then fell still.

"Good," Vhetin said. "Now tell me, where are you hiding the hydro-conversion bomb?"

The Quarren's eyes stretched wide; she had obviously not expected anyone outside their group to know about the bomb.

Vhetin tightened his grip against her throat and growled, " _Where_?"

With a shaking hand, the Quarren female pointed further down the hall. Vhetin stared down the dark hallway, thinking,  _Good. That_   _corresponds_   _with_   _where_   _Tex_   _is_   _leading_   _me._

Then he looked down at the Quarren, narrowed his eyes, and pressed the activation stud of the lightsaber. The  _snap-hiss_  of the activating weapon was muffled by the emitter that was pressed against her side, resulting in a quiet  _schff_ sound. The Quarren stiffened, her fingers twitching, then fell limp, her eyes going dark and dim.

"Oh my," Tex said from behind him. "You... you  _killed_  her!"

Vhetin stood, deactivating the lightsaber and hooking it on his belt. "She's a terrorist who is holding two of my friends and hundreds of guests hostage. She deserves worse than death."

"What are you going to do?" Tex said, staring at the Quarren's body.

"I'm going to take her armor," Vhetin said as he unstrapped her chestpiece, "and pose as one of these soldiers. Thankfully Quarren males and females are fairly similar in build, so this should fit."

After a few moments, he was fully clothed in the black body armor used by all of Uruc's terrorist thugs. Once he had taken all of the Quarren's armor, as well as a black facemask he found in a side-pocket of the jumpsuit she wore beneath her armor, he dragged her body into a side room and locked the door from the inside. He took her rifle as he left, then gestured to Tex as he closed the door behind him.

"Okay," he said. "Let's go."

They set off down the hall again, and he activated his secure comm channel to Floren.

"How close are you to finding the crate?" he asked.

"I have its location," the lieutenant replied after a moment, "but while you are out of your armor, I can't send the coordinates to you."

"Hm," Vhetin said, frowning. He stared at Tex, frowned thoughtfully, then said, "Can you remotely send the coordinates to this protocol droid? TX-22 he said his name was."

"I can try," the Imperial said.

Vhetin waited, folding his arms across his chest patiently. Tex's photoreceptors dimmed for a moment, then lit up bright again. He gestured down the hall to a door a few meters away, and said, "Behind this door is a hidden lift that will take us almost directly to the area where Uruc's terrorists are hiding the bomb."

Vhetin glanced at the droid, frowning as he pulled the black facemask over his head. He couldn't quite put his finger on what, but something about the droid sounded... off. Like the way he referred to Uruc and her thugs as 'terrorists' rather than 'intruders'.

He shrugged to himself as he shouldered the rifle and followed the droid into the lift. Maybe it was just rattled by the way Vhetin had executed the Quarren. Some droids were known to get glitchy around death; after all, it was part of their programming to safeguard sentient life where possible.

"What about troop forces?" Vhetin asked Floren. "Who can I expect down there?"

"From what I can see, there are four armed guards, two with Trandoshan heavy ACP repeaters, two with E-11 blaster rifles."

 _Great,_ he thought with a sigh. The E-11s weren't a problem; they were notoriously inaccurate and left little more than a burn even at fairly close range. But Trandoshan repeaters were so dangerous as to be illegal across most of the civilized galaxy and outlawed throughout much of the underworld as well. They were almost as big as Vhetin was tall and spat over ten metal bolt rounds a second. Anyone in anything less than a  _beskar'gam_  powersuit would be ripped to shreds in seconds.

Vhetin found himself wishing for what felt like the fifth time that he had been able to keep his own armor. Though he'd taken most of the kit on his belt, a single jetpack rocket would have cleared the entire room, leaving the durasteel crate relatively unharmed.

He switched his comlink to his private channel with Jay and Brianna, hoping to inform them of the situation.

He had barely opened his mouth to speak before Jay's voice flooded his earpiece.

"There you are!" she whispered frantically. Vhetin could hear the sounds of hostages murmuring in the background of her transmission as she said, "Stop turning your damn comlink off!"

"Why?" Vhetin asked. "What's wrong?"

"Brianna's been shot, and-"

" _What_?" Vhetin's heart turned to ice. "Is... Is she  _okay_?"

"She's fine," Jay reassured her. "She's hurt, but she'll pull through."

"I want to talk to her."

"There's no time!" Jay said. "I've been trying to raise you for almost fifteen minutes now. Brianna knows who Uruc's contact is, and you're going to want to hear it."

"It can wait," Vhetin said as Tex keyed open the door. "I'm on my way down to defuse the bomb."

"Floren!" Jay said. "Floren is her contact!"

Vhetin stopped mid-step. He thought over this for a full two seconds before he scowled and said, "What? How could-"

"Pelano said his security forces found that all of the schematics Uruc has been using came from a single terminal. All the schematics and codes were signed out under some Imperial bigwig named General Retiard.  _Floren_   _is_   _his_   _personalaide_."

Vhetin immediately spun away from the lift, putting a finger against the comm piece in his ear. "So he's the one who's been giving Uruc information all this time."

"Yeah," Jay said. "Right before Brianna was shot, Uruc miraculously found out that there were bounty hunters present. How do you think she found out about that?"

"Why didn't Floren just inform her when we showed up in Saiton?" Vhetin asked. "That doesn't make sense."

"I don't know, maybe he's got an agenda of his own. But you and I locked him up in the security terminal. He's got access to  _every_   _single_  cam in the building."

She sighed disgustedly and said, "He told me he couldn't see anything because Uruc's Warriors had covered the cams. I'll bet he was lying the whole time, trying to slow us down."

"Not for much longer," Vhetin said, striding down the hall.

"What're you going to do?"

"It's because of him that Brianna was shot. I'm going to find him," he growled, "and I'm going to kill him. He's too big a risk to leave to his own devices."

"What about the bomb?"

"Uruc won't set off the bomb while she's anywhere near Saiton; she's not the suicidal type. And it takes almost half an hour to get clear of the bomb's blast radius. Once she leaves,  _then_  the clock starts ticking.

"While you're in with the hostages," he said, striding down the hall, fists clenched, "try and find out what Uruc and her thugs are waiting for. They could have just killed the governor, dropped off the bomb, and left. See if you can find out why they're still here."

"Can do," she said. She hesitated, then added, "Be careful. I haven't seen that Wookiee around here in a while. He might be guarding Floren."

"You too," he replied, then signed off the comm.

His face pulled down in a scowl as he quickened his pace, pulling a lightsaber off his belt and flexing his grip around it.

Floren had betrayed all of them, given information to Uruc that had resulted in the loss of hundreds of lives, gotten Brianna shot...

It was time for him to face justice.

 

Jay let out a sigh of relief as she deactivated the comm and turned back to Brianna. The other woman was sitting propped up against a chair, holding a tablecloth to her side as a makeshift bandage. Most of the bleeding from her blaster shot had stopped by now, leaving nothing more than a painful burn.

Jay had gotten a glimpse at Uruc's pistol earlier - a custom Telemetech V-98 Overcharger - and now knew that the real problem was the tissue damage that had been caused by the bolt. Overcharger blasters used specially-compressed tibanna gas to create a small explosion upon impact. Brianna had taken quite a beating by the shot, even if it had only grazed her ribcage. Her skin around the wound was burned and blackened, smoke wafting up from her side whenever the wound was uncovered, and she winced whenever she moved.

"Vhetin is on his way to deal with Floren," Jay reported, pouring water found on a nearby table onto another tablecloth. "I don't think he'll be giving us any more problems. Here; time to switch out."

Brianna grimaced as she gingerly swapped out her makeshift bandages, pressing the damp tablecloth against her side. There was an audible  _hiss_  as the wet cloth came in contact with the huntress' burnt skin, and a single tendril of steam snaked up into the air.

"So," Jay said, using some more water to wash the blood off the old bandage and get it ready for reuse, "what's this whole deal with Uruc? Why did you decide to come along with us?"

Brianna chuckled, her eyes closed. She took a deep breath and murmured, "You sure pick your moments, Rookie. Now isn't really the time for interrogations."

"I'm just making an observation," Jay said. "I mean, you pretty much demanded to accept this contract with us, and you got shot because of it. I don't think it's too much to ask why."

"You would think that," Brianna replied, readjusting herself with a groan. After a few moments she sighed and said, "I guess you're right. We've got some time until Cin finishes Floren off."

Jay winced as she thought of the full weight of Vhetin's determination coming down on the young officer's head. She wouldn't want to wish that kind of fury on  _anyone_ , even if they had almost gotten her killed. She'd seen Vhetin in action before, seen him overwhelm enemies that were three times his size. And even then she had thought that she was only seeing the slightest example of his skill in combat.

And Jay knew that Floren was going to regret the day he had decided to join forces with Uruc.

She forcibly moved her attention back to the conversation at hand. She wrung bloody water out of the tablecloth and said, "So spill it. How do you know Uruc."

"I  _knew_  her," Brianna corrected. "Before she went... well, she's always been crazy, but I knew her before she really started hurting people."

"What do you mean?"

She rested her head back against the chair behind her and said, "You know how you and Vhetin were talking earlier about a bounty hunter's contacts? How you can rely on some of them because you know they'd put their lives on the line for you? And that you'd do the same for them?"

"Yeah," Jay said, remembering the conversation.

"Well... Uruc used to be a contact like that," Brianna said. "And she was more than that. She was a  _friend_."

"You have even weirder friends than I do," Jay said with a chuckle. "And trust me... that's saying something."

"Whenever I had a problem with intel," Brianna continued, "I would go to Uruc. She would provide top-notch information for half the price of other informants. I wouldn't have been able to bring in half the bounties I have without her, and I have to admit that she contributed to more than half my underworld publicity as a bounty hunter."

"So what happened?"

Brianna sighed and shook her head. "One day, about six years ago, she called in one of the hundreds of favors I owed her. I accepted without question; after all, we were friends."

"And?"

"And... her 'favor' was to track down a money launderer that had pocketed some of her credits. When I gave her the coordinates, she insisted that I come with her. And when she found the guy, she just... opened up with her blaster. Sprayed the entire street with blaster fire, killed more people than I could count."

She squeezed her eyes shut as she said, "And she  _laughed_. She was laughing while she did it."

"That's horrible," Jay said, grimacing in disgust. "What did you do?"

"What could I do? I tried to shoot her with a stun round, tried to buy myself time to find out what the  _hell_  had gotten into her. But then when she started shooting at me, I guess I realized that she was completely insane."

"So... what are you going to do?" Jay asked, thinking she already knew the answer.

"I'm going to be the one who brings her down," Brianna said bluntly. "I'm going to make sure the Imperials lock her up for the rest of her life, so that she can't hurt anyone else. And if that fails, I'm going to kill her."

Jay sighed and said, "It must hurt to have to treat a former friend like that."

Brianna shrugged, then winced as the motion put stress on her wound. "Yeah," she grunted, "well, we all have our demons, huh?"

Jay suddenly thought of Vhetin's seemingly unstoppable determination in battle, the cold precision with which he cut down his enemies. She nodded, frowning, and said, "Yeah. Some of us more than others."

Brianna seemed to be able to read her mind. "Vhetin is different. He doesn't kill out of bloodlust like Uruc. His psych reports may list him as borderline sociopathic, but with him it's different."

"How?" Jay asked the question out of curiosity, not attempting to argue.

"It's..." Brianna struggled with the words, as if weighing her words carefully. "It sounds odd and kind of scary, but Vhetin kills because he thinks it's  _right_. The only reason he's able to do the things he does is because he holds on to the belief that it's the right thing to do."

"What about when such a simple outlook doesn't work?" Jay asked. "What about when the right thing isn't... isn't the right thing?"

"In confusing situations like that," Brianna said, "he defaults to a... more severe attitude. The right thing to do is always whatever creates the most good and the least bad from a situation, no exceptions."

"Ah."

She chuckled. "Yeah. That's when things get hinky. That's when Vhetin can hunt down a guy for weeks without barely sleeping, when he can shoot a guy in the head without barely blinking. And it's one of the reasons people say he's almost a sociopath: no one else can see the galaxy the way he does. Not even me."

"So he's not a cruel," Jay said. "He's just misunderstood?"

"That's one way to put it. All I know is that when push comes to shove, he's more than willing to shove."

She narrowed her eyes and looked upwards, as if she could see through the ceiling.

"And I have a feeling," she said, "that our friend Lieutenant Floren is going to find that out the hard way."


	12. Don't Let the Wookiee Win

Vhetin's mind was a fog of rage as he stormed toward the third-floor security outpost he had set up for that bastard, Lieutenant Floren. He had a single lightsaber his right hand — not lit, but his fingers twitched as he fought back the impulse to push the activation stud and ignite the weapon — and his face was pulled down in a scowl. Tex followed behind him, glancing from side to side worriedly.

"So... this Lieutenant Floren," Tex said hesitantly. "What exactly are you going to do when you find him?"

"What else?" Vhetin growled. "I'm going to kill him."

"Like the Quarren female?"

"Exactly."

Tex cocked his metal head to one side in curiosity. "And what purpose does that serve?"

"There'll be one less treacherous  _chakaar_  in the galaxy," Vhetin replied. "That's enough of a purpose for me."

"And after that? Will you kill again and continue to kill?"

"Maybe."

"And then what? When does it end?"

Vhetin sighed and shook his head. It was a long time before he glanced over his shoulder at the serving droid and said, "For every malevolent being that I kill, two more who are even worse seem to take its place. There are no exceptions."

He turned his gaze back to the hall ahead and murmured, "It never ends."

"Then what is the point?" Tex asked, unwilling to let the conversation drop in the typical annoying protocol droid way. "Why do you continue to kill all these people if they will just be replaced by more?"

"Justice," Vhetin said. "The ability to punish those few I am able to find and serve as a living deterrent to future crimes."

"So... you are not motivated by money?"

"No," came his immediate response.

"But rather by a strangely amplified sense of self-righteousness?"

Vhetin replied almost as quickly as before as he shook his head and repeated, "No. I am not the kind of person others should look up to or idolize. I  _have_  no sense of self-righteousness."

"Then why?" Tex pressed. "Why do you do it?"

He clenched his teeth and spun on the droid, snapping, "Out of  _anger_. I do this to pay this damned galaxy  _back_  for the punishments that have been unfairly placed on  _my_  head."

Tex stared at him with his large, round droid eyes and said, "Interesting. And what punishments are these?"

"It's none of your business," Vhetin said, turning and stalking down the hall. "Now keep your vocoder shut. I'm not going to have you spoiling the element of surprise for me. I'll have one chance to take Floren out. If he escapes because you gave away my position..."

He let the threat hang on the air. It worked; Tex abruptly fell silent, walking quietly along behind him with a barely-audible whirr of servomotors.

They walked in silence for some time, Vhetin carefully scanning the area ahead for potential danger, before he held up a fist and said, "Wait. Hold up."

"Oh my," Tex murmured, his vocal volume turned down drastically. "What is it?"

Vhetin shouldered his stolen rifle and peeked around the corner. After a moment, he pressed his back against the wall behind him and let out a deep breath.

"Two of 'em," he whispered. "A Wookiee and a human."

"Is that a prob-"

Tex abruptly fell silent, probably remembering Vhetin's earlier threat, and Vhetin stole a glance around the corner again.

"Okay," he breathed. "Stay here, stay quiet, and I'll be back in a-"

Suddenly, cold metal hands wrapped around his neck, squeezing with a whine of servomotors and cutting off his air. Vhetin gasped and clutched at the hands, turning to find Tex at his throat, his photoreceptors glowing bright red.

"I will not allow you to harm more sentient life," the protocol droid said in a flat, expressionless voice. "If I must permanently decommission you to achieve that, so be it."

"T-Tex," Vhetin gasped, gripping the droid's metallic wrists and pushing him back into the hall behind them. "What are you...stop this now!"

"Negative," the droid replied. "My programming cannot allow you to harm these organics."

"W-why?" Vhetin gasped, slowly pushing against the droid. "Why these organics? They're your... intruders!"

"Irrelevant. I will not allow you to harm them."

"Program... override," Vhetin gasped, wracking his mind for the access code for the restaurant's droid servers that he'd taken from the security post while checking through the building's systems. "Program override priority code Bravo-Alpha-Alpha-Thirty-Eight."

"Ineffective," Tex droned. "My program override serial number has been changed. I am no longer at the mercy of your simple organic code words."

"How... how is that..."

His eyes narrowed as sudden understanding dawned.

"Floren," Vhetin gasped, grimacing as the droid squeezed his throat tighter and tighter. "Floren altered your programming when he accessed your computer core to give you the coordinates for the bomb."

"Affirmative," the droid intoned. "And when I was not able to stop you from killing the Quarren female, I set aside an entire cycle of processor function designated only to prevent you from harming more of the organics."

"They're...  _terrorists_ ," Vhetin growled. "They've already killed more people than I  _ever_  have."

"Irrelevant," Tex repeated, his eyes glowing scarlet as Vhetin pushed harder against his chest.

They quietly struggled across the hall, grappling with each other. Vhetin gasped and grunted as he tried to break the droid's incredibly strong hold on his neck. Tex made no sound save for the barely-audible buzz of the servomotors in his hands as he tightened his grip, crushing Vhetin's windpipe.

"Your termination is almost complete," Tex said as the edges of Vhetin's vision darkened. "Priority accomplishment in ten... nine... eight... sev-"

There was a hiss as Vhetin reached behind Tex and keyed the emergency door opener for the lift behind him, making the doors sheath open to reveal a dark lift shaft behind the droid.

Without a word, Vhetin shoved against the droid one last time, sending him tumbling, unbalanced, into open air. However, Tex's hold on Vhetin's neck was still locked in, and Vhetin was dragged to his knees, gagging as the droid's full weight tugged at his neck. Tex hung in mid-air below him, his metal feet clanging quietly against the wall of the shaft as he stared up at Vhetin with glowing red eyes.

Vhetin braced his arms against the sides of the lift to prevent him from being yanked down into the shaft with the droid. Tex's scarlet eyes flashed and he droned, "Warning! Warning! Cease your resistant behavior at once, organic!"

Vhetin let out a groan as he pulled his head back out of the shaft, hauling Tex up to his shoulders out into the hall.

"Priority Override!" Tex cried. "Terminate hostile organic target immediately! Servomotor power increased to two hundred percent!"

Vhetin gasped and his eyes flew wide as the droid's hands compressed with urgency, crushing his throat even harder than before.

"Priority!" the droid repeated, "Priority! Pri-"

There was a smash, followed by a scream of tortured metal as a lift car suddenly slammed down into the opening, severing Tex's robotic arms at the shoulder. Vhetin collapsed onto his back, coughing uncontrollably as the droid's grip - suddenly robbed of power - released itself instantly. He heard muffled robotic scream emanating from the shaft below the elevator car. After a few moments, there was a distant crash of metal against metal, and the droid's scream was abruptly silenced.

Vhetin gasped again and again, clutching at his neck as cool air flooded his lungs. It felt as if his throat and chest were on fire, and he threw Tex's severed limbs away from him.

The lift doors slid open in front of him, revealing a single human Warrior with an Imperial assault rifle. The man started at the sight of a fellow Warrior lying there on the floor. He stepped forward and said, "What the kark happened to you?"

It took Vhetin a moment to reply. For a moment, he thought the Warrior was going to shoot him. Then he remembered his disguise; it seemed that the Quarren female's armor was standard kit for the Warriors, and he looked no different from any other Warrior.

When he had finally caught his breath again, he managed to choke out, "Stupid... protocol droid. Tried to attack me."

The Warrior chuckled darkly as he helped Vhetin stand up. "Tell me about it. We've had another one down in the kitchens konk Roploro over the head with a cooking pan. Damn clankers. Where'd it go?"

Vhetin coughed again as he gestured at the lift. "You... karked him up real good with the elevator."

The Warrior chuckled as he slung one of Vhetin's arms around his shoulder and helped him stagger around the corner towards the two other Warriors. He said, "Come on. There's a med kit in Floren's security outpost."

The huge black-furred Wookie leveled his bowcaster at them as they came around the corner, but the Warrior held up a hand. "Hold up, big guy. He's one of us. Just got the life throttled out of him by one of them crazy protocol droids runnin' around the place."

The Wookiee roared loudly, but lowered the bowcaster as the other human guard turned and keyed in the access code to open the door to the room beyond.

"Can you believe they were stupid enough to give Floren access to all the restaurant's security systems?" the Warrior helping Vhetin said as they stepped into the antechamber to the security post. "It made it a freakin' cakewalk to get in here."

"I can't believe it, no," Vhetin coughed, tightening his one-armed grip around the Warrior's shoulder. "Lucky break, huh?"

"You got that right."

The Warrior had no way of knowing that, beneath his black facemask, Vhetin was grinning from ear to ear. And as soon as the large security door slid shut behind them, the Wookiee and the human guard couldn't hear the crackle of neck bones breaking from the room beyond.

 

Floren tapped at the control console, his fingers flying over the holographic keys, trying to get that damned TX-22 droid to respond. It had probably completed it's objective of killing Vhetin before powering down like many other droids he'd encountered.

"Come on," he muttered. "Come on, you dumb clanker. Activate!"

The door into the security chamber slid open, revealing a human male Warrior with a black facemask. Floren glanced up at him, then back to the controls.

"What?" he grumbled. "Can't you see I'm trying to work? What do you want?"

"You," the Warrior said, raising the rifle, "dead."

Floren froze. He recognized that voice. He slowly deactivated the holo-terminal he'd been working at and spun in his chair to face the man.

"Vhetin?" he asked. "Is that you?"

The Warrior slowly nodded, his grip on the rifle's firing stud slowly tightening. Floren sighed and rubbed his eyes, thinking,  _Perfect. Just_ perfect.  _Damn TX droid._

"So..." he finally said. "You know the big secret of how Uruc was able to infiltrate the banquet. Now what?"

"Questions," Vhetin growled. "Then you die."

"Fine," Floren replied, shrugging. "Ask away."

Vhetin glared at him for a long time before saying, "Why? Why let Uruc kill the Governor?"

Floren chuckled. "I've been working with Uruc since I was twelve years old. Not that it would be on my report, but I grew up with her on Jabiim. She was my hero; leading the Resistance with the same cruel, ruthless efficiency with which the Empire treated us."

He sighed wistfully and shook his head. "She must have killed... I don't know, three thousand Imperials? Four thousand? I forget."

"So why join the Imps if you hate them so much?"

"Simple," Floren said. "Uruc needed a mole, an inside contact. And who would ever suspect a young, up-and-coming officer with just a hint of-"

He mimicked one of the nervous, twitchy looks he'd put on so many times in the past, then grinned widely as he finished, "-a hint of cowardice?"

"So you're behind all the attacks Uruc has made since she came here," Vhetin said. flexing his grip restlessly on the rifle grip.

"Oh, it's more than that," Floren said with another grin. "I smuggled Uruc away from Jabiim, and gave her safe passage to Mon Cal. After that, I provided her with all the intel she needed - all signed out under my commanding officer's name, of course."

"Of course," Vhetin echoed. "If it was ever discovered, an innocent man would take the blame for all of your actions."

"Oh, don't be so melodramatic," Floren said, waving a hand and turning back to his holo-terminal. "You know as well as I do that if our positions had been reversed, any other Imperial would have done the same. It's just business."

"And what about us bounty hunters?" Vhetin asked, taking a step closer. "Where to me, Jay, and Brianna fit into the equation?"

"You don't," Floren said. "At least you weren't supposed to. When you showed up, I half-expected you to shoot me every time I saw you."

"And when we didn't?"

"At first, I sought simply to eliminate you," Floren said. "When I learned of your first lead, Torren Kile, I made sure that I got to his apartment before you did."

The image of the old man, slumped over his table, rose unbidden to Floren's mind, making him smile as he said, "Of course, Kile had recognized me from my days on Jabiim, but he was a frail old man; he chose to try and flee rather than confront me. A few sniper rounds to the back of the head from the building across the street changed his plans.

"And then your girlfriend and your partner showed up," he sighed, "snooping around. I knew that a sniper round would only kill one of them if I was lucky, so I broke out a new piece of Imperial tech to deal with them."

"The Merr-Sonn plasma missile launcher," Vhetin murmured.

Floren nodded, remembering the huge, molten hole the missile round had melted in the wall of Kile's apartment, remembered the short flash of triumph he'd felt as he crouched on the darkened balcony across the street.

"But that  _still_  didn't take care of them," he said with a laugh. "Imagine my frustration as I not only failed to kill them, but they almost  _caught_  me, chasing me through the streets like a pair of Black Sun thugs."

"And then we not only took the bait that it was one of Uruc's thugs who had killed Kile," Vhetin said, "but we also thought you were the one Imperial we could trust."

Floren gestured to the security post around him, saying, "And you all but gave me the keys to the front door and free access to let in anyone I wanted! Not very smart of you, if you ask me."

"But  _why?_ " Vhetin asked. "Uruc stands to gain a lot from all this. What's in it for you?"

Floren laughed again. "Don't you see? Uruc is one hundred percent dependant on me for intel and protection from the Imperials. Right now she's paying me a hefty sum to keep her organization under wraps, but the moment she's of no more use to me... well, imagine all the fame, power, and credits that will be awarded to the man who was finally able to capture Jolee Uruc!"

"You sound pretty confident that you'll be able to keep her under control for as long as you want," Vhetin said. "Uruc is dangerous and unpredictable."

"Don't lecture me, Mandalorian," Floren snapped, tapping at the keyboard again. "You've done a disastrous job of bringing her in already, and you're no closer now. It was a mistake for you to even come to Mon Calamari.

"It's a mistake I'm going to correct one step at a time," Vhetin said, raising the rifle. "Starting with you."

Floren grinned. "Are you sure you want to do that? This room is magnetically sealed. If you miss, that blaster bolt will bounce around the room like a spice-high Ewok."

"It's a risk I'm willing to take."

Floren sighed and tapped in two more commands into the keypad and said, "But it is one that I, however, am not."

He hit a single glowing blue button and both layers of security door slid open with a mechanical buzz. Vhetin cursed and spun to the now-open door.

"Guards!" Floren shouted as he keyed open an emergency exit on the other side of the room. "Guards! This man is an infiltrator! Kill him!"

By the time Vhetin spun back to him, raising the rifle to fire, Floren was long gone.

 

Vhetin spun back to the security door just in time to see a huge black-furred Wookiee paw swing at his head. He rolled forward, past the huge Wookiee, and came to his feet in time to plant a fist in the human Warrior's face. The man staggered back with a cry, holding his bleeding nose as the Wookiee roared and came at Vhetin again.

A huge fist slammed against his chest as he turned, sending him sprawling head-over-heels back out into the hall. He rolled back to his feet as he saw the Wookiee lumbering forward, snarling and clapping its huge, long-taloned hands together in anticipation. Vhetin grimaced as a wave of pain washed through his chest, but he reached for his lightsaber hilt.

His fingers grasped at empty air. He frowned and looked down at his belt.

His lightsaber was gone.

Looking back up, he saw the cylindrical silver hilt lying past the Wookiee, on the floor of the security station where the hairy beast had first attacked him. He sighed wearily and raised his fists in challenge. He'd have to do this the hard way.

For anyone else, the prospect of taking on a maddened Wookiee in hand-to-hand combat was suicide. A single swipe from those huge paws would take someone's head off at the shoulders, and they could rip the arms off a Trandoshan with ease. But hand-to-hand combat was Vhetin's strong suit, and he had taken on bigger beasts than Wookiees before.

The black-furred Wookie roared and charged, lashing out with huge paws. Vhetin easily dodged the clumsy blows and slipped underneath a huge arm, landing three hard punches to his opponent's ribs. As the Wookiee spun towards him again, Vhetin caught the huge arm, twisted it, and used it as a handhold as he jumped off his feet and swung both feet into its throat. The Wookiee groaned and took a single step back as Vhetin landed heavily on his back, quickly scrambling to his feet as his opponent charged again.

The Wookie caught him in the chest with its abnormally-long claws, tearing through the flexiplast covering and using its hold on it to throw Vhetin up into the air. His back hit the ceiling hard and he landed in a heap at the Wookiee's feet. It raised a huge foot to crush him, but he quickly rolled out of the way. He put a hand on the wall as he pushed himself to his feet again.

The Wookiee pounded its chest and howled as Vhetin ran at it once more. He headbutted it in its hairy stomach, grabbing fistfuls of long fur and wrenching it to one side. The creature howled in pain and slammed its paws on Vhetin's back, sending him crashing to the floor again. It stepped back, reaching for the bowcaster on its back, but Vhetin jumped up and ran for it again. His boot landed on its slightly-bent knee, and he used it as a foothold as he jumped up, driving his armored knee hard into the huge creature's face.

There was a sharp  _crack_  as the Wookiee grunted and staggered back as dark blood poured from its nostrils. It moaned and shook its hairy head as Vhetin landed on his feet and stepped forward again.

Before he could take more than two steps, however, he felt someone else wrap their arms around his neck and hold him in a chokehold. He craned his neck and saw the human Warrior he'd wounded before, grunting as he held Vhetin in place. He drove his elbows into the Warrior's ribs, trying to break the hold, but the man was much stronger than Vhetin was.

The Wookiee seemed to regain its composure and lumbered forward, raising a huge paw and letting out a deafening roar.

Vhetin grunted as the Wookie brought its huge paw down with all its might, struggling against the chokehold. At the last second, he shifted his feet and spun, putting the human Warrior in the path of the descending paw.

The Wookie's claws dug into the Warrior's back, slicing through flexiplast, the harder duraplast beneath, and finally into skin. The human screamed in pain, and his chokehold loosened. Vhetin took advantage of the slight reprieve, headbutting the human in the face. As the man staggered back, Vhetin turned and leaped high into the air, landing a spinning kick against the side of the man's head. He sprawled into a corner and didn't move again.

Vhetin clenched his fists as the Wookiee roared again and stomped for him. As it raised its paw to slash at him yet again, he ducked out of the way and kicked the creature in the back of the knee. The Wookiee barked in surprise as its knees gave out and it stumbled to its knees.

Not wasting a moment, Vhetin grabbed the back of the Wookiee's head and slammed its face into the wall, then pulled it back and repeated the motion. Again and again he beat the huge beast's head against the hard wall, until a smear of dark blood covered the fancy wallpaper. The Wookiee released a gurgling  _ughh_  sound and struggled weakly against his grip.

Vhetin released the creature's head and dashed back into the security office. Behind him, he heard the Wookiee struggle to its feet and lumber after him. As soon as he was close enough, he dove towards his lightsaber, igniting it as he rolled to his feet again.

The Wookiee's paw descended into his vision, and he reacted without thought; he slashed, spun, and stabbed.

The lightsaber's humming blue blade stabbed deep into the Wookiee's chest just as its arm, severed at the shoulder, hit the ground with a dull  _thud_.

Vhetin grimaced as he pulled the energy blade from the creature, deactivating it as he turned away. Behind him, the Wookiee twitched and fell back onto the floor with a crash.

Vhetin was breathing hard as he surveyed the still security post. The emergency exit doors on the other side of the room were wide open, and Floren was nowhere to be seen.

 _Damn_   _it_ , he thought to himself, clenching a fist.  _He_   _got_   _away._

He strode toward the main security console, which was tuned to a holocam set up over the basement. Vhetin could easily see a group of Uruc's Warriors setting up the hydro-conversion bomb, hooking wires together and consulting datapad assembly instructions.

 _Not_   _good_.  _They're_   _getting_   _close._

He turned and stepped back, pulling open one of his belt pouches as he activated his comm.

"Jay," he said into it. "Bri. Somebody come in."

"Jay here," came her relieved voice. "It's good to hear from you."

"How's Bri?" he immediately asked.

"She's fine," Jay replied. "She's able to walk now, which is a vast improvement. She'll be good as new in a few hours. If we have that long."

"Floren is gone," Vhetin reported. "He escaped, but I don't think he'll be bothering us any more."

"That's good news," she sighed. "Now what?"

"I need a huge favor from you and Bri," he said as he pulled a red-and-yellow-striped packet out of his belt pouch. He ripped it open with his teeth and said, "It's going to be dangerous."

"Shoot."

He shook the packet, sprinkling a fine yellow dust across the floor. He trailed it out into the hall, stepping around the dead Wookiee, then crumpled up the empty packet and tossed it aside. "I need you, Bri, and the rest of the hostages to get your hands on any weapon you can think of - chair legs, broken wine bottles, whatever - and attack Uruc and her Warriors."

Jay let out a whistle. "That's a pretty tall order Vhetin. In fact, it sounds  _crazy_. You want us to fight armed terrorists with chair legs and broken wine bottles?"

"If everything goes according to plan," Vhetin said, pulling a similar packet — this one colored green — from his belt and sprinkling greenish powder on top of the yellow, "most of them won't be there. How many are guarding you now?"

There was a pause as Jay counted. Then she replied, "Ten."

Vhetin nodded. "Okay. I'm going to cause a distraction and hopefully draw most of the attention to me. There should only be a few Warriors left in there - easy pickings for a hundred hostages, no matter how well-armed the terrorists are."

Jay hesitated, then said, "Okay. I'll see what we can do. What's the distraction?"

Vhetin cracked a smile as he stepped back and surveyed the trail of powder leading into the security post. "You'll know when I spring it."

"Oh  _shab_ ," Jay said. "I hate it when you say that."

"Just get ready," he replied, turning away. "When Uruc sends some of the guards away to investigate, wait two minutes before attacking, then give 'em hell."

She said, "Okay. Good luck."

"You too," he said, then signed off the comm and turned his gaze back to the powder trail.

One of the things he'd noted during his inspection of the building's layout was that each floor had a specific designation. The first floor was the main restaurant, the second floor was the kitchens, and the third floor was for maintenance. Every floor was extravagantly decorated, but it still served a purpose. The third floor was predominantly reserved for the power equipment and coolant intake tanks, which were stored in a small compartment between the second and third floors directly beneath the security post.

The yellow powder was a chemical known as tetrophilioxide, and was usually mixed with water to form a harmless treatment for indigestion. But when mixed with a special chemical called  _Naast_  - found only on Mandalore's moon, Concordia - and ignited, it burned for ten seconds before exploding with more force than any thermal detonator. Add that to the combustible coolant fluid in the tanks below, and the resulting explosion would punch through this floor and probably shake the entire block.

He nodded, satisfied, as he pulled his lightsaber off his belt. This would serve as a  _very_  good distraction.

Then he activated the lightsaber and touched it to the powder at his feet.


	13. The Bomb

Jay was in the process of explaining Vhetin's plan to the last of the hostages when a huge explosion wracked the building and the floor bucked beneath her feet. Hostages screamed, Warriors cursed, and Brianna smiled.

As the explosion faded, Uruc glanced up at the ceiling and muttered, "What the kark was  _that?_ "

The gestured to five of the nearest Warriors, including the purple-skinned Twi'lek, and growled, "Get up to the third floor and see what the hell just exploded."

The Warriors saluted and jogged out of the run, rifles shouldered. Jay turned back to the hostages who were staring at her and Brianna expectantly.

"Remember," Jay said quietly, "wait two minutes, then attack. Got it?"

The Imperials nodded, clutching at broken bottles, meat knives, and durasteel table legs that had been unscrewed from the tables. Jay herself had a table leg, while Brianna had opted for several cutting knives that she swore she could throw like a professional.

The next two minutes had to be the most tense of Jay's life, made even more so as Uruc projected a hologram and barked, "Report!"

The view from the holo looked like it came from a arm-mounted projector. Blasterfire was audible from the recording, and Jay saw the purple Twi'lek's face in the recording as he shouted, "We're getting ripped apart up here! We need reinforcements!"

A moment later a glowing bar of energy erupted from his chest and the Twi'lek slumped to the ground. A masked figure stepped into the projectors view, and Jay heard Vhetin's familiar voice growl, "You want me Uruc? Come and get me."

The hologram cut out with a  _pop_ , and Uruc scowled deeply. She cursed, then turned to two other Warriors.

"You two!" she shouted. "Round up Alpha group and get up there. I want that guy's head on a  _platter_!"

The Warriors glanced between each other nervously, but saluted and left the room, leaving only three more Warriors. Uruc sighed and shook her head as she scowled.

"On three," Brianna whispered, tensing as Uruc turned her back. The huntress' eyes were full of fury as she flipped a meat knife between her fingers in anticipation.

"One..." Jay breathed, hefting her table leg, "Two... _three_!"

With the deafening shout of almost a hundred charging men and women, the entire crowd surged toward Uruc and her Warriors. The woman's eyes stretched wide in surprise as she pulled her pistol and shouted, "Damn it! Fire! Fire! Kill them all!"

A human Warrior stepped up to her shoulder, raising a rifle. Next to Jay, Brianna cocked her arm back and let a knife fly. It hit the Warrior in the chest blade-first and he staggered away, shouting in pain. Uruc spun to look at the man, then looked back at the crowd with fear evident in her eyes.

Brianna broke through the throng of people and ran straight for her, shouting, "Uruc!"

The terrorist leader stumbled away as she saw Brianna approaching, turning and running through the double-doors that led into the hall beyond. With a shout of rage, Brianna sprinted after her, disappearing from view.

Jay surveyed the scene around her; the hundred hostages had quickly taken care of the Warrior guards, beating them into unconsciousness. The entire fight had lasted less than ten seconds, and none of the Imperials had been hurt in the least.

Jay gestured to the unconscious Warriors and said, "Tie them up."

A tall man dressed in a dirty green tunic nodded and said, "Shouldn't we call law enforcement?"

"Not yet," Jay said. "There are more of Uruc's Warriors in the building. We'll call law enforcement only when they're all accounted for."

The man nodded and moved to tie up the unconscious terrorists. Jay turned away and tapped the comlink in her ear.

"Vhetin," she said. "You all right?"

"I'm... a little busy at the moment," he grunted over the comm. Jay could hear the synthetic hum of his lightsaber and the sound of blasterfire in the background of the transmission. "But it's nothing I can't handle. Are you guys okay?"

"The center room is secure. Uruc took off, but Brianna was right behind her."

"Good," Vhetin said. "Brianna's motivated enough that she'll be able to catch her easily."

Jay nodded and said, "So... what do you want me to do now?"

The blasterfire suddenly stopped over the comm with a muffled scream. Vhetin took a moment to catch his breath, then said, "I need you to go to the basement and defuse the hydro-conversion bomb."

That stopped Jay in her tracks. She frowned and said, "I must not have heard you right. You want me to  _what_?"

"I can't get there any time soon," Vhetin explained, "and Uruc is going to detonate the damn thing if she can't get this situation under control."

Jay sighed and nodded. As much as she hated to admit it, he had a good point. "Okay. Do you have any idea what's waiting for me down there?"

"Four armed Warriors."

"Weapons?"

He sounded apologetic as he said, "Two of 'em have Trandoshan ACP repeaters, two have E-11 blaster rifles."

"ACP repeaters?" Jay said, raising her eyebrows. "And you want me to take them on?"

"If there was any other way-"

She cut him off, heading for the door and scooping up a fallen terrorist's rifle as she went. "I'll take care of them. But I have no clue how to deactivate the bomb."

"Don't worry," he replied. "Tish Wouta was able to provide us with the deactivation codes. When you get there, I'll walk you through it."

She nodded and deactivated the comm, heading out into the hall. She made a quick stop in order to change out of her waitress disguise and back into her normal clothing. Since the hostages were safe there was no longer any need to blend in with the crowd and she had a feeling she was going to need her pistol.

Two minutes later she was striding toward the lift to the basement, hefting her borrowed weapon. A cursory examination revealed that it was a BlastTech energy shotgun with some fifteen shells in the clip. In the close quarters of the basement, such a weapon would come in handy.

She strode down the hall, stepped into the lift, and pressed the dark red button labeled  _Basement_. As the lift doors closed in front of her, she fed a shotgun round into the rifle and took a deep breath. Unlike when she was usually about to enter a firefight, when her heart would be pounding in her ears, she felt nothing but calm now. Her face was set in a mask of determination as she watched the readout above the lift door drift ever so slowly towards the words  _Sub-basement_   _1_.

She was  _so_  ready for this hunt to be over. And the guards down there were one of the last things standing in the way of her ability to finish her job.

The lift ground to a halt, and Jay took another deep breath. As the doors opened, her shotgun came up.

Not a moment too soon, either; two Warriors standing guard over the hydro-conversion bomb must have heard the descending lift, and had their blasters trained on the door. She shouted in surprise and ducked as blaster bolts stitched the air above her head. She somersaulted out of the lift and came to her feet, pulling the firing stud as she sighted in on the nearest Warrior.

The shotgun bucked in her hands and let out a pounding  _thoomp_. Bright green energy bolts exploded from the barrel and hit the Warrior in the chest, sending him flying back against the wall.

Jay racked back the charging rod, feeding another energy round into the chamber and taking cover behind a large durasteel crate. The loud  _snap_  of the remaining Warrior's rifle filled the air, and Jay's eyes watered as ion smoke filled the air.

She silently counted to three before leaping from cover and firing the shotgun again. The energy bolts clipped the Warrior in the shoulder and he shouted in pain as he fell to the ground.

Jay didn't stop to finish the job; she didn't have time. She just slammed the butt of the shotgun against the man's forehead, knocking him unconscious. She paused for a moment to grab his rifle, slinging it over her shoulder before moving on.

 _Okay_ , she thought as she crouched behind a large coolant pipe. She stole a glance around the crate, then moved back and thought,  _those_   _two_   _were_   _the_   _ones_   _with_   _the_   _rifles. All_   _that's_   _left_   _are_   _the_   _guys_   _with_   _the_   _heavy_   _repeaters._

The sub-basement was dark and dirty, nowhere near the extravagant spotlessness of the above floors. Rusted coolant pipes crisscrossed over the ceiling in confusing tangles before stretching away over the floor. Sporadic jets of steam spouted from ruptured pipes, and the floor was slick with condensation. The few lights that were working weren't working well, casting flickering light across the area and throwing sparks down onto the floor below.

She ran from cover, heading for an opening in a wall. She thought she saw a rectangular shadow that might just be-

She screamed in surprise as a rapid explosion of deafening  _boom_   _boom_   _boom_ s shattered the silence of the sub-basement. She dove to the ground, covering her head as duracrete chips rained down around her. Scrambling on her hands and knees she managed to crawl behind another durasteel crate, shaking hair out of her face as she heard bullets ricocheting off the durasteel behind her.

As the explosions stopped, leaving her ears ringing, she risked a glance around the corner of the crate. Standing only a few meters from the crate were two of the largest humans Jay had ever seen, hefting angular Trandoshan repeaters. They muttered between each other before pulling bands of ammunition from packs on their hips and feeding them into the repeaters.

Jay pulled back, letting her head hit against the crate behind her. She let out a long breath, flexing her grip on the contoured handle of the energy shotgun. As she listened, she heard heavy bootfalls coming around the edge of the crate.

She tensed, waiting for the perfect moment. As she saw one of the huge Warriors peek around the corner, she fired at his masked face. He shouted in surprise and jerked back, and the energy rounds missed him. He stepped in front of her and leveled his huge repeater just as she was reloading the shotgun.

Jay moved before she had time to think; she threw the shotgun aside and jumped at him. She grabbed his arms and forced the repeater off to the side as she drove her knee into his solar plexus. He let out a pained  _huff_  and his grip on the repeater slackened. The huge gun fell to the ground with a crash.

Jay took a single step back and balled her fists together, slamming them across his face. He staggered away, holding his face, as the second Warrior raised his repeater.

 _Uh_   _oh_ , she thought.  _Time_   _to_   _move_.

She broke into a run, pulling the stolen blaster rifle from over her shoulder and firing at the man as flames spouted from the repeater's barrel.

She sprinted into the other room, where the other Warrior was shaking his head to clear it. He turned to look at her just as she jumped into the air and landed a double-kick in his stomach and chest- a melee move she had learned from Vhetin.

She saw the Warrior with the repeater emerging from the entryway behind her, and once again moved without thinking. She grabbed the weaponless Warrior by the shoulders and spun, using him like a shield as the other man opened fire again.

The weaponless man's chestplate shattered as it was bombarded by hundreds of metal-bolt bullets. Jay raised the rifle over the man's shoulder and fired at the remaining Warrior. The red blaster bolts impacted against the man's chest and he staggered back, falling to his knees.

Jay let the wounded Warrior crumple to the ground and ran at the second man before he could regain his balance. He looked up at her and hefted the repeater, but she lashed out with a roundhouse kick at his head. The sole of her boot slammed into the side of his head, and he crumpled to the ground with a grunt.

Jay surveyed her handiwork, breathing hard, then activated her comlink.

"Vhetin," she said as she dragged the three unconscious Warriors to a support column in the center of the room.

"I'm here," came his response.

She pulled a length of whipcord from a pouch on her belt and tied them to the column, ensuring that they wouldn't be able to reactivate the bomb when she left. She grunted as she pulled their bonds tighter and said, "The sub-basement is secure. I'm ready to try and deactivate the bomb."

"Good," he sighed in relief. "Can you see the bomb?"

Jay stepped up to the rectangular shape she had glimpsed earlier. It was a large boxlike shape, about waist-high, covered in a dark tarp. She pulled the tarp away, revealing a beige-colored piece of machinery with blue a central dynamo that was spinning at a dizzying rate. The machine was humming loudly, and Jay could feel it vibrate as she touched the side.

"Uh... yeah, I think I found it," she said over the comm. "How do I shut it down?"

"Okay... the first thing you need to do is retract the protective casing surrounding the bomb itself. There should be a blue button."

It didn't take long to find. She pressed the button, and the bomb let out a loud buzz. Jay screwed her eyes shut and took a step back, convinced the thing was going to explode.

But it didn't; with a hiss of hydraulics, the beige casing split down the center and lifted away, revealing the spinning cylinder inside and hundreds of wires tangled around each other.

"Okay," Jay breathed. "Step one complete. Now what?"

"You have to shut down the center dynamo inside. Cutting a green-yellow striped wire should do that."

"Okay," she said, stepping forward and pulling her vibroblade from her boot.

"Be careful," he warned her. "Whatever you do, don't touch the dynamo. That thing is generating enough heat to melt your hand all the way to the wrist."

"Got it," she said, watching the spinning blue cylinder with wary eyes. "I'm cutting the wire now. You did say the red and yellow wire, right?"

"No!" he cried. "Don't-"

"Calm down, Stripes," she chuckled. "I'm just messing with you."

There was a long pause over the comm, then Vhetin said, "Don't do that again."

She laughed again as she carefully guided the vibroblade into the mess of wires. She fished through the tangled mass with her fingers until she found the green-and-yellow-striped wire and pulled it free of the others. With a quick motion of her wrist, she sliced through it.

The blue light emanating from the dynamo died instantly, and the spinning cylinder slowly spun to a halt, smoke wafting up into the air.

"Okay," she said, stepping back and brushing her hands off. "Did that do it?"

"Not yet," he said. "What you have to do now is remove the dynamo and break it, so that there's no chance of reactivating the bomb."

"Break it?"

"It's made of low-grain transparisteel," he explained. "It's a lens, meant to catch a plasma beam created elsewhere in the machine, amplify it, and use it to heat the combustion materials. Destroy it, and they'll be missing an important component without which the bomb is relatively useless."

"'Relatively?'" she echoed as she gingerly pulled the smoking dynamo from the machine's housing and threw it hard against the durasteel floor. With a loud crash it shattered into a thousand sparkling pieces that skittered across the dark floor, flashing as they went.

"Yes," Vhetin said. "There's another part to take care of. The polytorizene."

"The chemical that makes water flammable," Jay clarified. "Great. Where do I find that?"

"It should be spread through fifteen converter tubes set around the edge of the machine," he said.

"Yeah. I see them. What do I do now?"

"Destroy them," he said. "Shoot them, it doesn't matter."

"You're insane if you think I'm going to shoot a  _bomb_ ," she said, stepping away from the device."

"We don't have time for this, Jay," he said impatiently. "Just destroy the converter tubes, and the thing should be useless."

She noticed his use of the word  _should_  with some apprehension, but pulled her blaster and carefully shot each and every converter tube. As she reloaded her pistol, watching the bomb casing smoke, she said, "Okay. Is that it? 'Cause I'm hating every minute I'm within a hundred feet of this thing."

"One more step," he reassured her. "There's an ignition wire that's strung along the inside of the casing. It's a kind of dark scarlet, and it hooks in just below the dynamo housing. Cut that, and the ignition's useless. The bomb should be harmless enough as it is, but I want to make sure the thing is permanently out of commission."

"So," she said as she stepped forward again, "in other words, I should cut the red wire?"

"Exactly."

She chuckled as she leaned into the bowels of the machine once more and felt around for the red wire. "You do realize that in every holoflim ever made they say to cut the  _green_  wire to deactivate the bomb."

"Holofilm writers work from their imagination," he said. "Things are different in real life."

" _Oya_  to that," she muttered as she found the red wire and sliced it in half. She stepped away once more, sheathing the blade in her boot once more and saying, "Okay. I'm done."

"Good," he said. "Get up to the top floor and meet me in the central restaurant room. I'm going to change back into my normal kit, then we'll see if we can't catch up to Brianna and Uruc."

She turned away from the bomb, shot each of the unconscious Warriors with a stun round just to be safe, and said, "I'm on my way."

 

Vhetin was just pulling his helmet over his head as Jay pushed open the double-doors to the central restaurant room. She had changed back into her normal hunting gear as well, and she spoke as she strode up to him.

"Is the building secure?" she asked.

He nodded as he tucked his flight suit's collar up into his helmet and vacuum-sealed his suit. "Yeah. All of Uruc's thugs are accounted for and secured in an industrial freezer up in the kitchens, and law enforcement is on their way. Just one last loose end to clean up."

"Then let's see if we can't find out where Uruc and Brianna disappeared to," she said, turning to leave as he hooked his lightsaber onto his belt.

They both jogged toward the restaurant exit, rounding up any leftover weapons and ammunition from Uruc's terrorists that they could find. As they went, Vhetin activated his helmet's comm and said, "Brianna. Bri come in."

The woman's voice was labored as she grunted, "Brianna here. What do you want, Cin? I'm kind of in the middle of something."

"How close are you to Uruc?" he asked as they stepped out into the raging storm.

In the hours since the hurricane had begun, Vhetin and Jay's attention had been... elsewhere. And they'd been so distracted by Uruc and her Warriors that they had no way of knowing that outside, the storm was raging ferociously. As they passed out from under the awning at the front of the restaurant, the wind caught Vhetin's  _kama_  and tugged at it so hard it almost ripped it from his belt. Jay cried out in surprise, wincing against the rain that shot down from the sky like bullets. Thunder cracked over their heads and lightning slashed down through the air, striking tall buildings and trees in a nearby park.

Vhetin struggled to hear Brianna's voice over the noise of the storm, even though his helmet's audio dampers were working at full strength.

"I'm in a speeder, lagging about twenty meters behind her," Brianna said. "She's making a run for it."

"What's she driving?" Vhetin asked.

There was a long pause before she replied, "Black Terasipo speeder convertible, roof up. She probably stole it from some local Imperial bigwig."

Transmit your location to my HUD," Vhetin said. "We're coming after you."

"Will do," she said, then signed off the comm, leaving nothing but the sound of the storm overhead.

"Now what?" Jay shouted over the driving rain. "We can't go after Brianna on foot in this!"

Vhetin's gaze roamed around the area, looking for anything that could help them in this situation. Any speeder buses in the area were almost certainly shut down because of the hurricane, Imperial transportation was too far away to rely on...

"Got it," he muttered as his gaze fell on the speeder lot only a few meters from them.

"What?" Jay shouted.

"Follow me!" he shouted back, gesturing for her to follow.

"What are you doing?" she asked as he leveled his pistol at a speeder window.

"Simple," Vhetin replied, and pulled the trigger. The speeder window exploded inward, and he explained, "We need a ride. As specially appointed Imperial Intelligence agents, we are hereby commandeering this vehicle."

Jay stared at the speeder, then looked at him and grinned.

"I like the way you think, Stripes," she said.


	14. A Cornered Animal

Two minutes later, and they were racing through the streets, the wind lashing through the blasted-open window. Vhetin grasped the control wheel and spun it swiftly to one side, sending the commandeered speeder racing down a side alley. It sent waste bins flying as the vehicle barreled into them, trash flashing over the front viewshield.

"Hold on!" Vhetin shouted as he spun the wheel the other way and they screamed out onto a main street again.

Jay grunted as she was thrown into the side of the speeder, her head bouncing against the window. "Ow! Be more careful!"

"Do you want me to obey standard travel procedures," Vhetin growled, flooring the accelerator, "or do you want to catch Uruc?"

Jay grasped at a safety rail over the passenger-side door and hesitated before asking, "Does this thing go any faster?"

"Let's see," he said, and gunned more fuel into the engine. The speeder shot down the street, the engine letting out a mechanical roar. Vhetin turned up the viewshield cleaners to clear rainwater from his line of sight and activated his comm again.

"Brianna," he said. "Transmit revised coordinates and activate your tracker. I need to know where you are."

"Transmitting now," Brianna said, sounding as if she had her teeth clenched.

They raced through the deserted streets for a few moments before Brianna's voice came back. She murmured, "Wait a minute..."

"What's wrong?" Jay asked, wincing as Vhetin took another sharp corner.

"Uruc might be heading for the spaceport."

Vhetin narrowed his eyes, focusing on the rain-slicked road ahead. Thunder rumbled through the air as he said, "Why would you say that?"

"Look at my coordinates," she replied. "Is there anything else in this sector of the city?"

"Check the map," Vhetin said to Jay, pulling up a map of Saiton on the speeder's holodisplay. "And compare it against the local underworld database I'm transmitting to the display now. Is there anything of value to Uruc in Brianna's part of the city?"

Jay consulted the map for a few moments, murmuring, "There's a... uh, there's a spice lab two blocks down from her... there's a black market fence who lives in an apartment complex on the street they're taking now... apart from that, I can't see anything."

" _Shab_ ," Vhetin swore. "So she's heading for the spaceport. Why would she do that?"

"Beats me," Brianna replied. She paused for a moment, then said, "Do you have my transmitter?"

"Yeah."

"Okay," she said. "I'm marking Uruc's speeder registration number. Do you think you could find her using that?"

"I could hack into the Imperial database and activate the speeder's tracer," Jay said. "All Imperial vehicles are marked with them in case they need to be quickly located."

"How do you know how to hack the Imperial database?" Vhetin asked, glancing over at her.

"Please," she said. "Do you think you were the only one training me? Jaing has been teaching me some rudimentary slicer skills."

"Good man," Brianna grunted.

"What are you going to do Bri?" Vhetin asked, gunning the accelerator again as they sped across a bridge.

"I need to find out what the hell is going on," Brianna said. "I'm going to go visit an old friend and ask him a few questions."

"You're bailing out on us?" Jay asked.

"I might be able to find out what Uruc's planning to do," Brianna said. "I'll catch back up as soon as possible. Are you two okay without me?"

Vhetin nodded. "We'll find Uruc. But if you're not back by the time we catch her, you're losing your cut of the reward."

Brianna laughed and there was the sound of a speeder's engine revving in the background transmission. "I'll make it back. That's a promise."

Her transmission cut out and Vhetin said, "Jay, get hacking. We don't have much time."

Jay chewed at her lip as she tapped at the holographic keyboard. After a few moments, she clapped her hands and said, "I'm in. Now it's just a simple matter of activating the tracer-"

She was working faster than she could talk, and before she had finished her sentence she sat back and said, "There. Do you have her location?" she asked.

Vhetin consulted his HUD for a moment, then sighed in relief as he saw a flashing purple dot light up on his map of Saiton City.

"Got her," he said, and took a sharp turn to the left. "She's two blocks down and a half-kilometer ahead. We can catch up to her in a minute at most."

"How far is she from the spaceport?"

He consulted the map before saying, "Five minutes. We can get her."

He cursed as a nearby speeder bus waiting station was blown over by the wind right in front of their speeder. He spun the wheel and they swerved to avoid it.

"If this storm gets any worse," Jay said as thunder cracked over their heads, "We're not going to be able to go after Uruc even in the speeder."

"That makes it all the more important for us to get to her fast. If she escapes, we'll never find her again."

It was only a few seconds before they barreled out onto an eight-lane speedway, only a few hundred meters behind a black speeder convertible with the thin durasteel roof pulled up against the rain. Jay grasped the safety handhold above her door and pointed, saying, "There she is."

"Hang on," Vhetin said as he floored the accelerator again and shot forward. Jay was jerked back into her seat from the acceleration, then pulled her pistol.

"What me to distract her?" she asked, racking back the charging rod.

"Go ahead," Vhetin said, swerving around an abandoned emergency vehicle parked in the center of the road. "See if you can shoot out the rear repulsor."

Jay retracted her door's viewshield and leaned out into the storm, the wind from the hurricane and their acceleration whipping her hair around her head. She gripped tightly onto the safety handhold as she stretched out her shooting arm and fired three times.

The yellow blaster bolts ricocheted off Uruc's black convertible harmlessly. However, she had obviously not been expecting fire, because her speeder swerved dangerously towards a side-street packed with abandoned vehicles. She pulled away in time, however, and shot away down the speedway.

Lightning snapped above their heads, forking across the sky before flashing down and striking a row of trees placed along the right side of the speedway. One of the trees was severed in half by the lightning explosion, and toppled out into the street.

Vhetin yanked the wheel hard to the left as Jay shouted in surprise, pulling herself back inside. The speeder slammed into the side of the tree, the front bumper crumpling up before Vhetin gunned the accelerator and the vehicle flew up and over the trunk, landing hard and screaming down the speedway once more.

Jay let out a long breath; the branches of that tree, some of which were almost the size of the speeder itself, had missed her head by inches.

"That was too close," she said, shaking her head as she leaned out the open viewshield again and continuing to fire at Uruc's speeder.

Suddenly, the black speeder skidded to a halt, and the driver's door opened. A dark figure sprinted into the rain, heading for a collection of dark buildings in the distance.

"She's heading for the spaceport!" Jay reported, pulling herself back into the speeder. "That place is packed with people sheltering from the hurricane. If she makes it in there, we'll lose her!"

Vhetin scowled as he slowed down slightly. "She won't stay there. She has a plan and whatever it is, she's going to stick to it. She's using the refugees in the spaceport as a distraction."

He opened the driver's side door, ignoring the duracrete of the street below him as he leaned out the door.

"Take over," he said. "Loop around the shelter and keep an eye on the exits. Head in when I call you."

"Vhetin," Jay said, leaning over and grabbing the wheel. "What're you going to-"

She was cut off as Vhetin simply leaped out of the speeder, hitting the duracrete below the speeder and rolling for a few meters before coming to his feet and sprinting towards the spaceport.

Jay scowled as she moved over to the driver's seat, pulling the door shut and grasping the control wheel.

 _Crazy Mandalorian_ , she thought, shaking her head.

 

 **Refugee**   **sector, Saiton**   **City**

The door to Kitco's Speeder Repair was blown inward, duracrete chips flying everywhere. Tish Wouta shouted in surprise and dove behind the front desk, covering his tentacled head and reaching for a blaster he kept in case of emergencies.

Before his long-fingered hand could even touch the grip, however, a hard boot landed on his wrist, causing him to cry out in pain.

"You lied to us," Brianna growled, grabbing the Nautolan by the front of his grease-stained jacket and slamming him against the wall hard enough to send a cloud of dust puffing into the air. She grimaced, fire ripping through her side as she put stress on her blaster burn. With effort she ignored the pain and concentrated on the situation at hand.

She pressed a pistol to his chest as he cursed and said, "I don't know what the kark you're talking about Bellan. I gave you all the information I-"

Brianna pistol-whipped him across the face and said, "How much is Uruc paying you to keep her  _real_  plan under wraps?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Wouta said, scowling at her with his huge black eyes.

"When she knew her plan at the banquet was foiled, Uruc ran. But she didn't run for her nearest hideout, didn't run for any trusted allies. She went for the  _spaceport_. Somewhere she  _knew_  Imperials would be able to track her. Why would she do that?"

When Wouta didn't say anything, she tightened her grip on the pistol and said, "We already found out that Floren was her Imperial contact. Is he helping her off-planet?"

Wouta blinked slowly, then sighed and said, "Fine. Let me go and I'll tell you everything."

Brianna stared at his green-skinned face for a moment, then released her death-grip on his jacket and stepped back. She folded her arms, tapping one foot expectantly.

Wouta brushed dust off his jacket, then glanced at Brianna's torn and burned dress and grunted, "Nice getup. What, did you get invited to the lady's night at the local Bounty Hunter's Bar?"

"Don't be a smartass," Brianna snapped, holding a hand to the burn on her side. "Spill it. I want to know everything."

Wouta sighed and said, "Fine. For the past two months, Uruc's been getting bored of Mon Calamari. She's planning to leave."

"Like I suspected," Brianna said.

"No, not like you suspected," Wouta shot back. "I'm not talking about just her. It's her entire  _organization_. Thugs, Warriors, local money launderers... she's paying everyone to pack up and follow her."

"Where?" Brianna asked.

Wouta shrugged. "I don't know. I really don't."

When Brianna took a menacing step forward he winced and said, "Come on, you think that information's bouncing around in the streets? Only Uruc and her affiliates know the location, and she's threatened to kill anyone who even  _thinks_  about snitching to the Imperials."

"So what about the stunt at the banquet? Killing the Governor?"

"Oh, Vonn's dead is he?" Wouta asked, a grin stretching across his thin lips. "He got what was comin' to him if you ask me."

"Why did she attack the banquet if she was planning to leave?" Brianna asked forcefully.

He shrugged. "I don't know. She wanted to end her time on Mon Cal with something extravagant. Wanted to go out with a bang, if you catch my drift."

Brianna nodded. Blowing up Saiton City with a custom-built hydro-conversion bomb sounded like just the kind of  _bang_  that would appeal to a psychopath like Uruc.

"So what's her plan?"

"She's moving out tonight," Wouta said, shrugging. "Packing up all her stuff onto a cargo ship at the spaceport.

"That's not good," she said out loud. "We're running out of time."

Without another word, she spun on her heel and limped back to her stolen speeder. As soon as she was inside she floored the accelerator and shot out into the stormy city, her face a mask of determination.

Hopefully Cin and Jay would be right on Uruc's tail when she got to the spaceport. Either way, they'd need her help to bring the bitch down.

 

**Saiton City T-Sector Spaceport**

"Okay," Vhetin said. "I'm clear. Jay, head on in."

"Any sign of Uruc?"

"No," he replied. "But you should keep tabs on the back entrance, just in case."

Jay nodded as she pulled the speeder over and stepped out into the storm. She pulled her jacket tighter around her against the driving as she ran for the back entrance of the spaceport. She paused for only a moment to pull a pencil-thin holoscanner from her belt and set it into a niche near the door. The scanner would record the area and send a message to Jay's datapad if anyone resembling Uruc passed through its line of sight. It would give them some warning in case she decided to bug out.

'Always have your exits and your enemy's exits covered' was one of the central rules of bounty hunting, one that Jay was determined not to forget. They'd gone through too much to have Uruc escape now.

As she moved on and stepped through the doors to the spaceport, she was instantly plunged into a sea of scared, rain-soaked refugees. She scowled as she made her way slowly through the crowd.

 _Great_ , she thought.  _We've gone from a crowd of hostages to a crowd of_ potential  _hostages. All its gonna take is a single stray blaster bolt and this entire situation will get real ugly._

"Vhetin?" she transmitted over the comm. "Sound off. Where are you?"

"I'm fine," he replied. "But I'm going to go silent for a while. See if I can't draw a little less attention to myself."

"Do you see Uruc?"

"No. But I'm going to try..."

She sighed as his side of the comm went quiet. She hated it when he did this; he got so caught up in the hunt that he sometimes forgot that he had a partner who was trying to watch his back.

She shook her head and focused, scanning the crowd for Uruc. Jay would have thought that, with a mechanical arm, Uruc would stand out in a crowd. But Jay couldn't spot the woman anywhere; there must have been three hundred refugees just in this single seating area of the spaceport.

The entire crowd seemed hostile as she made her way to the lifts in the southeastern area of the room. She was aware of every single gaze that fell on her, even if only for a moment.

She passed by a brown-skinned Zabrak with several broken cranial horns who was talking with a short, bug-eyed Gand wearing an environment suit. A little further on, a family of Wookiees were lowing to each other and shaking rainwater from their fur. Jay felt slightly guilty as she passed by them, knowing what Vhetin had done to the Wookiee who had worked for Uruc.

She passed by several Mon Calamari civilians and thought,  _screw this. I'm not going to find Uruc by just walking around._

So she approached one of the fish-like Mon Calamari males and touched his shoulder gently. He started and turned to face her, his large eyes gazing at her serenely.

"Excuse me," Jay said in the sweetest voice possible. She smiled and transmitted a holo of Uruc from her wrist-mounted datapad. "Have you seen this woman? I'm a friend and I need to speak with her."

The Mon Cal silently shook his head and turned away, and Jay moved on to a tall, silent Falleen female standing a few feet away. When the green-skinned female didn't know either, Jay wandered around for a bit, making her way to the other side of the room.

She stopped a passing spaceport tech, a Twi'lek male with dark blue skin, and asked him if he'd seen Uruc. To her surprise, he said he had.

"Really?" she asked, hoping that her eagerness didn't seem out of place. "Where?"

The tech pointed toward the stairs at the western end of the room. "She asked me for directions to boarding hall Tee-Fourteen. I told her that there are no outbound flights scheduled until this hurricane lifts, but..."

"Thank you so much," Jay said, smiling as she turned away. As soon as the Twi'lek man had moved on, however, her smile instantly faded and she activated her comm.

"Vhetin," she said, "I have a possible location. Uruc asked for directions to boarding hall Tee-Fourteen."

"I know," he said. "I'm there already. I can see her."

"What? How-"

"I have my ways. But I need you down here now; it looks like she has some friends here to back her up."

"On my way." Jay made her way as quickly as possible through the crowd, stopping for only a moment to consult a wall-mounted holomap to find the way to boarding hall T-14. Then she was off again, taking the stairs two at a time in her haste to catch up with her partner.

"What do you want me to do when I get there?"

"We're going to be slowed down by her thugs," Vhetin said. "But try and take her in either way. I have a plan."

"Oh good," Jay said. "Mind sharing it this time?"

"No," he replied. "For now, it has to stay with me."

"Great," she said, rolling her eyes as she headed down a transparisteel-plated hallway that - on any normal day - would have offered a fantastic view of the landing pads. Rain pounded against the transparent metal, making it almost impossible to see anything further than fifteen feet away.

When she emerged into boarding hall T-14, it didn't take long to spot Uruc. She was standing at the boarding gate, speaking to a blue-painted protocol droid. Jay ducked around a nearby corner, glancing around it to watch the terrorist leader without being seen.

"I know the spaceport is shut down you lousy clanker," Uruc snapped, flexing her mechanical hand, "but I'm telling you, I'm a storm-certified pilot and I  _need_  to deliver my cargo before-"

"I'm afraid that's quite impossible," the droid said in a stubbornly patient voice. "Local protocol does not allow for civilian pilots to leave the spaceport under any circumstances."

As Uruc argued with the droid, Jay whispered into her comlink, "Where's her thugs?"

"Plainclothes," Vhetin said quietly. "Look to your left and you'll see a big human in a Mon Cal tourist shirt."

Jay didn't even ask how Vhetin knew where she was; just like Uruc's thugs were hidden throughout the room, she knew he was out there somewhere as well, waiting and watching for his moment to strike.

She glanced to the left and saw a huge man in a blue-white tourist shirt and big black optical shaders covering his eyes. He was leafing through a holozine, keeping one eye on the conversation between Uruc and the spaceport droid.

"Not very stealthy, is he?" Jay observed.

"Unfortunately the others are smarter than he is," Vhetin said.

With his help, Jay identified the rest of Uruc's four thugs: a spindly-legged Dug leaning against the wall near an indoor restaurant, a tall, graceful-looking humanoid man with glowing red eyes and a braid that fell to his waist, and another human who was standing alone in the shadows at the end of the hall, pretending to look through a collection of souvenirs.

"So..." Jay said. "What do you want me to do?"

"Normal bounty hunting routine," Vhetin said. "Get out there and make a scene. I'll handle the rest."

Jay shook her head, not liking this plan in the least. But she followed his command, nonetheless; she stepped out from behind the corner and pulled her pistol, aiming it at Uruc.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a dark figure wrap its arms around the neck of the large man in the tourist shirt. With a wrench, the figure drove the man's head back into a support pole behind him, knocking him unconscious. Jay blinked and turned her attention back to her target. Whatever Vhetin was doing, he'd be able to take care of himself.

"Jolee Uruc!" she shouted as nearby civilians noticed her pistol and screamed. "Hands on your head! You're under arrest!"

Uruc's eyes were wide as serving plates and she cursed as she shoved the blue protocol droid aside and ran for a transparisteel walkway connecting the T-14 to another boarding hall.

Civilians were running everywhere, trying to get as far away as possible from the crazy woman with the gun. It turned the entire T-14 boarding hall into a nightmare, making it almost impossible to track a single target.

Uruc glanced over her shoulder, watching Jay sprint after her, then was knocked to the floor as another of her guards - the spindly Dug - was tossed bodily in front of her from somewhere in the crowd. They two toppled to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs. The Dug groaned, blood leaking from its mouth as it hit the floor with a dull thud. There was a smoking blaster hole in its stomach, smoke wafting lazily up from the wound.

Uruc moaned in disgust and shoved the Dug away, scrambling to her feet and looking wildly around as Jay jogged toward her, setting her pistol for stun.

Uruc spun toward a door to the outside, then backed away with a shout as she saw another of her guards sitting limply in a chair, a souvenir necklace reading  _Mon Calamari: The Galaxy's Paradise_  wrapped tightly around his neck, his face blue.

The last remaining thug saw what had happened to his compatriots and took off running, melting into the panicking crowd and disappearing from view. Jay considered shooting him in the back with a stun round as he went, but decided against it. He wasn't the target.

Uruc herself was almost backed into a corner, her eyes wild as she frantically searched for an escape route.

"Hands up," Jay said, taking a single step closer and aiming her pistol unwaveringly at the woman's chest. A single stun bolt would drop her, and this mission would be-

But Uruc wasn't beaten yet. She grabbed a passing young man in a blue-white tourist shirt by the throat, dragging him in front of her and using him as a human shield. She balled her mechanical hand into a fist and a silvery cylinder emerged from her metallic wrist.

Jay froze; that was a high-heat flamethrower. She'd seen the specs in Uruc's bounty file. A single burst from that weapon would kill the man.

"Put the pistol on the ground," Uruc growled, a ferocious look in her eyes.

"Let him go, Uruc," Jay said, the pistol remaining pointed at the terrorist leader. "It's over. Law enforcement is on their way, and you can either come with me alive or leave with them in a body bag."

" _Drop the gun!_ " Uruc screamed, clenching her grip on the young man's throat. " _Now!_ "

"P-please!" the man cried, struggling ineffectively against Uruc's grip on his throat. "Do what she says! I don't wanna die!"

Jay hesitated; Vhetin had long ago told her to do whatever was necessary to bring down her target, even if that meant sacrificing an innocent civilian to bring in someone who would kill hundreds more. And in hostage situations like this, the hostage-taker was most likely going to kill the hostage whether her orders were obeyed or not.

 _In situations like that_ , he'd told her,  _you have to objectively, impartially weigh the good against the bad. If the target is sure to kill hundreds more people if they escape, it's worth a single innocent life to bring them to justice._

Jay's jaw clenched, and she tightened her grip on her pistol, preparing to fire.

But when she looked at the young man's panicked face, saw the terror in his blue eyes, she knew that she had only one choice.

She lowered her blaster with a sigh and set it on the ground. As she slowly straightened again, she raised her hands in surrender and said, "Okay. You win."

Uruc snarled at her, then threw the man aside and dashed away, into the crowd. Jay glanced after her, then knelt by the young man, putting a hand on his shoulder.

"Are you all right?" she asked.

He rubbed his throat and coughed. "Y-yes. You... you  _saved_  me. How can I ever repay you?"

"Get as far away from the spaceport as you can," she said as she stood and dashed after Uruc again, shoving panicking civilians aside as she went. She had an uncomfortably strong sense of deja vu, and she was unconsciously reminded of Anchorhead, when she'd chased after a sniper who had tried to shoot her.

 _I swear my life is just going around in one big circle_ , she thought. Then she scowled and sprinted faster through the spaceport, just barely able to see Uruc's black dreadlocks as the other woman forced her way through the crowd. Jay tried to get a shot off, but couldn't ensure that she could hit Uruc without collateral damage.

A blue-uniformed man caught her arm as she passed, saying, "Excuse me, ma'am, but you need to get to-"

She didn't think; she just cocked back her arm and pistol-whipped him across the face. He cried out and staggered back, releasing his grip and holding his bleeding nose.

"Sorry!" she called back to him as she ran past.

She didn't know how long she chased after Uruc; halls seemed to flash by faster than Jay could see, and she had eyes only for the back of Uruc's head. She shoved civilians aside, struggling to keep Uruc in her line of sight. The terrorist was fast, easily faster than Jay, but the crowd was helping to slow her down.

" _Attention all civilians,_ " came a deep voice over the intercom. " _The spaceport is on emergency lockdown. We must ask that all present_   _make their way in a calm and orderly fashion to boarding halls T-1 through T-10 for emergency procedures_."

Good. With all the civilians heading for the boarding halls on one side of the spaceport, it was safe to assume that Jay and Uruc would be the only two heading in the other direction. Jay felt a slight flush of relief as she thought,  _at last, some luck._

Ahead of her, Uruc sprinted up a staircase, shoving people over the railings as she went. She cast a fearful glance over her shoulder as she reached the top, then sprinted out of sight.

Jay was right behind her, shouting, " _Move!_  Get down!" as she leaped up the stairs as fast as her legs would carry her. She didn't stop to help people up; she didn't have time, and they weren't her problem. She just did her best to dodge them as she went.

She spotted Uruc ducking down a side hall just as she came to the top of the stairs. She was about to head after her when someone caught her arm again. She spun to punch them again, but a familiar voice said, "Hey. Are you okay?"

"Vhetin?" she asked, tearing her gaze away from the hall Uruc had ducked down and facing her partner. She punched his chestplate - gently, though, so she wouldn't break her knuckles - and snapped, "Where have you  _been_?"

"Covering your back," the Mandalorian replied, his expression hidden as always behind his helmet's faceplate.

"Yeah, well now we lost Uruc," she panted, resting her hands on her knees as she gestured down the hall. "She got away."

"Actually no," he said, shaking his helmeted head. "I managed to plant a portable tracer on her."

"A tracer?" Jay asked, frowning ass she straightened again. "How did you manage to do that?"

"A little chaos can go a long way," he said as they both jogged toward the hall Uruc had disappeared down. "I'll fill you in after we've got her in custody."

At the end of the tiny hall was a rusty brown door marked  _EMPLOYEES ONLY_. Vhetin kicked it in, shouldering his rifle and covering the area as he stepped in. Jay was right next to him, squinting through the darkness as she roamed her pistol over the area.

They appeared to be in some kind of maintenance room, similar to the sub-basement where Uruc's thugs had placed the hydro-conversion bomb. There were coolant pipes everywhere, as well as power converter boxes taller than Jay was and circuit boards that controlled the flow of power to the entire spaceport.

The only sounds Jay could hear were the loud hisses as steam burst from leaking pipes and the steady  _drip drip drip_  of condensation falling from above. There was no sign of their target.

"Uruc," Vhetin called. "We know you're here. Give up peacefully, and this'll end a lot quicker and calmer for everyone involved.

When no one answered, Jay leaned close to her partner and whispered, "Where is she? Is the tracer working?"

She struggled to pick his dark armor out from the shadows as he gestured in front of them, to a thick support pillar wrapped with coolant pipes and hoses.

"She's right up there," he whispered as he stepped forward, his bootsteps surprisingly quiet for someone in such heavy armor. "On three?"

"Okay," Jay breathed, flexing her grip on her pistol "One... two..."

Before she could finish, a pillar of fire erupted from the shadows, enveloping Vhetin and sending a wave of burning heat through the room. Jay shouted in surprise and jumped away, somersaulting and raising her blaster.

"Uh-uh," came Uruc's voice. "You're in a room packed with coolant pipes. A single stray blaster bolt will send this entire spaceport sky-high."

"Like you tried to do with all of Saiton City?" Jay asked, getting to her feet again. She spotted Vhetin kneeling nearby on the floor, arms and legs glowing in the dark as his combat suit smoldered.

"Are you okay?" she asked him.

"I'm a little toasted," he grunted, getting to his feet and patting out a single tendril of flame from his elbow. "But I'm otherwise fine."

He looked around the room, his helmet's flag-like rangefinder sliding down into tactical position as he pulled his rifle into his shoulder again.

"Jay," he whispered, jerking his head to the panel of circuit boards behind them. "Get the lights. I'm the only one who can see in the dark."

She nodded and stepped back. As she crept toward the glowing panel of lights behind her, Vhetin moved deeper into the darkness, calling out, "Uruc... don't make us do this the hard way."

It didn't take long to find the controls for the maintenance room lights. Jay hit the button and blinding white light flooded the room. She squeezed her eyes shut, grimacing as they adjusted to the light.

She had barely opened her eyes before a huge weight barreled into her from behind, driving her to the floor. She rolled over as she felt a hard fist slam into her face. She cried out and she heard Uruc's voice screaming, " _Bounty hunter scum!_ "

Jay struggled against Uruc, who was laying into her with both organic and metallic fists. She balled her fist and punched Uruc in the forehead, but the other woman barely flinched.

" _You will not take me!_ " she screamed, punching at every inch of Jay that she could reach.

Vhetin grabbed the woman around the waist and tried to haul her off Jay, but Uruc elbowed him in the neck, sending him staggering back against the support pillar wrapped with coolant hoses. One of them burst, spraying steam all around him. He shouted in pain as the heated steam blasted his already-scorched skin. Within moments he was completely hidden from view in a cloud of coolant steam.

Uruc beat Jay's wrist against the ground until her grip on her blaster was forcibly loosened. Uruc snatched the pistol and pressed the barrel against Jay's forehead.

"Not this time, bounty hunter," she whispered, scowling furiously as her finger tightened on the firing stud.

There was a loud  _clack_  of a charging rod being racked back behind Uruc, and her eyes suddenly went wide. Jay relaxed as she saw a figure standing behind Uruc, obscured by the terrorist's head. Vhetin had finally found his way out of the coolant steam. And just in time, too.

But it wasn't Vhetin who spoke next. It was a woman's voice with a smooth Coruscanti accent that said, "Hands up, Uruc. Drop the pistol."

Brianna's voice.

Uruc raised her hands above her head and tossed the pistol aside with a curse as she stood and stepped away from Jay. She turned to Brianna, who was standing propped up against a nearby power converter box and holding her burned side. A pistol was in one hand, aimed directly at Uruc's head.

"Hands... behind your back," the huntress panted.

"Come on, Brianna," Uruc said, also breathing hard. "Let me go... for old times sake. We're friends, after all-"

Brianna punched Uruc in the stomach, sending the terrorist leader to her knees.

"We're not  _friends_ ," Brianna snarled as she hauled Uruc to her feet again by the back of her neck. "We stopped being friends the day you slaughtered your first batch of innocent civilians."

"They deserved it," Uruc said, laughing as she clambered to her feet again. "They all deserved it."

"Put your damned hands behind your back," Brianna snapped. Uruc did as she was ordered, and the bounty huntress clapped a pair of binders over her wrists with a quick motion.

A heavy bootfall sounded next to Jay's head, and she craned her neck to see Vhetin offering her a hand. She took it and allowed him to haul her to her feet.

"Are you all right?" he asked her.

She rubbed at a bruise forming on her cheek and waved her other hand in the air, dismissing the question. "I'll be fine."

He nodded and stepped past her, to Brianna. He put a hand on her shoulder and said, "How about you? Are you okay?"

Brianna let out a shaky laugh. "I'm not as fine as Jay is, but... I'll mend."

"Here," Vhetin said, slinging her arm around his shoulders. "Let's get you to the nearest boarding hall. They've got to have a med kit somewhere."

He looked to Jay and motioned to Uruc, who was muttering to herself and throwing the hunters furious glares. "Can you take her? Just make sure she doesn't leave. I'll find a law enforcement officer who'll take her off our hands."

She nodded and reached down to scoop up her pistol. She pressed it between Uruc's shoulder blades and said, "I'll be here."

Vhetin nodded, thanked her, then helped Brianna limp out of the room. Jay smiled as she watched them walk together down the hall, then around the corner and out of sight.

 _Here_ were the signs of caring between the two that she'd been missing before. Vhetin and Brianna may not be the most noticeable couple Jay had ever seen, but as she watched her partner help his wounded girlfriend limp away, his devotion to her was so obvious that it was almost impossible to miss.

She was still smiling as she turned away. Here, finally, was the first sign of humanity she'd ever seen in the ice-cold Vhetin. And she had to admit that when she saw him like this, he was a much more likable person than she had first thought.

"You know," Uruc said suddenly, "I could use someone with your skills as a hunter. You did well to catch me, and I could pay four times more than whatever the damned Imps are giving you. Just let me go, and you could be set for life."

Jay slapped the woman across the back of the head, silencing her.


	15. The Storm is Over

**Later**

It was half an hour before Imperial Law Enforcement finally arrived at the spaceport; they had been spread thin around Saiton, trying to keep some semblance of order throughout the storm-ravaged city.

And it wasn't just law enforcement that came to the spaceport. As the three hunters waited for the enforcement officers to cart Uruc off to whatever dark prison cell they had planned out, they also saw at least fifty holonews speeders skid to a halt outside the spaceport.

Vhetin wasn't surprised; a criminal as dangerous as Jolee Uruc had been brought to justice. It was the news story of the century, and every holonews station was sure to want in on it.

The enforcement officers had a hard time getting through the door with all the news reporters struggling to get to the bounty hunters first. Lamp lights were shone on the hunters, who were standing at the top of a flight of stairs and holding a bound and gagged Uruc between them. Holorecorders started rolling almost instantly.

A reporter forced his way through the crowd on the stairs and pushed an amplicoder in front of Brianna. The reporter introduced himself before asking, "Ma'am, you were able to apprehend Jolee Uruc with only fifteen civilian casualties. How were you able to pull off this incredible feat?"

Brianna frowned. "Incredible? Fifteen civilian casualties is too much of a loss for any operation,  _or'dinii_. This isn't an incredible feat."

A second reporter pushed his way forward and shoved another amplicoder in Vhetin's faceplate. He jerked back slightly as the reporter said, "Sir, is this accomplishment a sign that the Mandalorians are indeed on the rise again as Senator Tellin Torr claims?"

Vhetin's gaze darted between holocams and he clenched his fists, uncomfortable at so much attention. He hesitated, then said, "Uh... no comment. You want to know anything, talk to  _te_   _Mand'alor_."

"All right, all right," came a deep voice. Jay craned her neck to look over the sea of reporters to see none other than Commander Pelano pushing his way through the crowd.

"Break it up," he called, pushing reporters aside. "Break it up everyone."

"Sir! Sir!" called a reporter. "Will you be Governor Vonn's new replacement? Are you even going to try for the position of Governor?"

Pelano raised his hands and said, "Everyone needs to clear out now. There will be a press conference just as soon as we can get Uruc to a secure location. You will all be notified of the time and place. Now if you would please head back to your speeders..."

The crowd reluctantly broke up as Pelano turned to them.

"Well," he sighed, running a hand through his messy red hair. "I do believe I owe you three thanks. You not only apprehended Uruc, but you discovered the identity of her contact within Imperial Command. You could say that you did my job for me."

He shook hands with each of them as he said, "I cannot tell you how grateful I am. You have done the Empire a great service."

Vhetin frowned beneath his helmet and said, "We're not here to do any services to the Empire. Where's the reward?"

"Ah yes, of course," Pelano said, stroking his moustache. "The credits will be transferred to your accounts, split equally into thirds. You are free to split them among yourselves as you see fit after that."

"Clean credits?" Vhetin asked.

"Of course."

"No tracing IDs?"

Pelano frowned. "Yes. I fail to see why-"

"We may have done the Empire a 'great service,'" Vhetin said, "but that doesn't mean I trust you guys."

Pelano turned back to the crowd of reporters, civilians, and enforcement officers waiting at the foot of the stairs. He motioned to the officers and said, "Gentlemen, escort the prisoner to her holding cell."

No less than five officers escorted Uruc out of the building, three of them aiming blasters at her head. As soon as they were gone, Pelano nodded respectfully to the hunters one last time. Then he spun on his heel and headed down the stairs toward the reporters, clapping his hands and saying, "Until the Governor's office releases a statement, ladies and gentlemen, I will tell you of the heroic deeds I myself accomplished while the banquet was under siege."

The reporters  _ooh_ ed and  _ahh_ ed and followed him away. Vhetin stared after him and snorted, shaking his helmeted head.

"I saw him on the holocams in the security post," he said. "He was hiding in a janitor's closet the whole time."

Jay sighed and rubbed her eyes. "I couldn't care less about all the glory that gets piled on his head. We got the bounty, we've got our money, and now we can go home."

"Home," Brianna sighed with a smile as they walked down the steps and made their way through the crowd. "Back to a warm  _Oyu'baat_ , friends, and peaceful quiet."

"Back to a warm shower, food, and a good eight hours of sleep," Vhetin added, nodding.

"Back to..." Jay hesitated, unable to think of anything. When Vhetin and Brianna looked over at her expectantly, she shrugged and said, "Well, away from  _here_  at least."

All three of them laughed as they stepped outside. Above their heads, the hurricane had finally moved on. Trees were toppled on the freeway in the distance; one of them had smashed through the speeder Vhetin and Jay had commandeered to pursue Uruc. There were puddles spread across the ground and a slight drizzle of rain fell from the sky. A single shaft of golden light broke through the clouds, a final signal that the storm was over, promising a bright new day ahead.

As they walked, Brianna slipped her hand into Vhetin's. He looked over at her and smiled beneath his helmet, squeezing her hand gently. She smiled and squeezed back.

Vhetin sighed and finally relaxed. The storm wasn't all that had passed on, leaving a brighter future just around the corner. He suddenly was filled with the optimistic feeling that everything with Brianna was going to be okay.

Jay frowned suddenly and said, "Wait a minute. You said you'd explain how you managed to plant a tracer on Uruc."

"Oh yeah, right," he said. He chuckled and said, "Remember the guy Uruc tried to use as a shield when you had her at blasterpoint?"

"Of course," she said, nodding. "Why?"

He just stared at her. After a moment, she gasped and cried, " _What_? That was  _you_?"

He laughed and nodded. "Yep. Ditched my armor plates and grabbed a tourist shirt off the rack. She's never seen my face, so she didn't know who I was."

"And you-"

"And I slipped a tracer into her pocket when she was 'holding me hostage.'" he finished, nodding. "It was easy."

"Damn it!" she said, shaking her head. "I... I wasn't even paying attention to the guy! I... I don't remember what he looked like!"

Brianna grinned and said, "Better luck next time, Rookie."

And together, they strode off into the city as the sun broke through the clouds above their heads, driving away the last remnants of the storm.

~~~~~~~~

 **Refugee**   **sector, Saiton**   **City, Mon**   **Calamari**

The former lieutenant, now known only as Floren, walked briskly down the street in the refugee sector, ignoring the smell and picking his way around piles of rubbish. Unlike the last time he'd been here — while in the company of those three damned bounty hunters — there were now speeders rumbling up and down the street, heading back and forth through the city on business that wasn't important or interesting enough for Floren to even notice.

The hurricane had passed, leaving bright skies and a city with more than just a black eye. It was going to take Saiton months to repair all the damages caused by the storm; trees toppled in the freeway, HoloNet transponder columns picked up by the winds and thrown through the sides of buildings, and millions of credits worth of damage to private and government property.

But again, that wasn't important or interesting enough to Floren for him to care any more. His interest was now completely fixed on what was left of Jolee Uruc's organization.

It was true that Uruc and her Thirteen Warriors were all either dead or locked up in Imperial prisons scattered throughout the galaxy, and that without them the rest of the organization was swiftly crumbling. But that was a problem that Floren intended to deal with in time.

He strode uninvited through the door to Kitco's Speeder/Submersible Repair Shop and surveyed the main lobby.

The sickly-colored tile on the wall was wet and dripping from a broken window that had allowed rain water to fall for hours into the shop. Water pooled around Floren's Imperial-issue boots, and there were sheets of flimsi floating through the lobby.

Tish Wouta was grumbling to himself as he pushed a mop through the water, scrubbing at a film of mold that had quickly grown across the floor and ineffectively attempting to push the worst of the water out the door. His head-tentacles slithered over each other in agitation, and he looked up at Floren with his wide black eyes.

"They're waiting for you in the back," he said sourly, jerking his head at the door to the back room. As Floren strode silently past, he heard the Nautolan muttering, "Damn scum, fouling up my establishment."

Floren couldn't tell if he was talking about the mold on the floor or the beings who were waiting in the repair garage.

Scattered through the back were all those who were left from Uruc's decimated organization: fifteen beings, most of which were human males. They surveyed Floren with scowls and nasty chuckles as he stepped forward.

"You were the one who called us all here," said one of them, a huge bald human man with a black dragon tattoo up one huge arm. He picked at his teeth with a pencil-thin knife blade and said, "The least you could do is show up on time."

"I think I have more beings to flee from than you do," Floren shot back. He was, after all, an Imperial officer who had defected. The full might of the Empire would crash down on his head if he wasn't careful.

The man snorted, then said, "What do you want?"

Floren shrugged. "In a word: I want you to work for me."

That got their attention; all around the room, Uruc's former employees muttered to each other, throwing glares at him. The man with the tattoo snorted again, then spat on the floor at Floren's feet.

"And why would we do that?"

"Jolee Uruc's demise is tragic, and it has resulted in a dramatic cut in pay to all of you," Floren explained calmly. "I'm offering you your old jobs back. With me, we can restore the Thirteen Warriors to their former glory and all become rich men in the process."

"You want us to take orders from a jumpy little pipsqueak like you?" said another of the men with a nasty chuckle. "When all nine of the Corellian Hells freeze over, kid."

Floren shrugged and turned away. "A pity. But in the end it's your paychecks. You can take them or leave them as you see fit."

He took exactly five steps toward the door before someone spoke, drawing him back into the room.

"Wait," said the man with the tattoo, holding up a meaty hand. "I like your plan."

Floren raised an eyebrow as he turned back to them. He folded his arms and said, "Really? Then you'll accept my proposal?"

The man nodded. "Yep. With one factor removed."

He drew a pistol from his hip and aimed it at Floren.

"You."

Floren couldn't even scream before the man fire three times, hitting him squarely in the chest. He flew backward and landed on the dirty, damp floor a meter away, dead before he hit the ground.

The tattooed man turned back to the rest of the assembled thugs and gestured for them to follow him.

"Come on guys," he said. "Let's get outta here. Tomorrow, we start work again. Saiton will be our city in six months."

He was met with a chorus of approval as they all tramped out of the building, into the depths of the city. After a few moments, they were lost in the flow of traffic through the crowded refugee sector.

Tish Wouta watched them go, then turned away. And instead of calling law enforcement to track down the brutes, he simply sighed and switched the sign on his door from  _Open_  to  _Closed_.


	16. Home, Sweet Home

**Twelve**   **hours**   **later, over**   **Keldabe**   **airspace**

Snow was falling from the air, dusting all of Keldabe with a coat of white as  _Void_  and  _Vengeance_  swooped down toward the city spaceport. Brianna had parted with them in orbit, saying that she had business to attend to on Concordia, and hadn't accompanied them to Keldabe.

Large flurrying clouds of snow were blown up into the air as  _Vengeance_  came in for a landing, resting on its landing struts with a mechanical sigh and powering down with a fading hum of its engines. Jay looked up into the sky and smiled as she retracted the canopy of her ship and hopped out. She brushed a fine layer of snow off her ship that had collected in the few moments since she'd landed.

"It looks beautiful," Jay said as Vhetin stepped up from behind her.

He nodded, shaking snowflakes from his black-armored shoulders. "Yeah," he said. "First snowfall of the season."

As Jay looked over at the doors to the spaceport, she noticed that they had a welcoming party. Four stormtroopers, their armor the exact shade of white as the snow, were waiting for them with rifles held at attention.

Vhetin noticed them as well and cursed under his breath. He stepped up to them and said, "Can we do anything for you guys?"

"Governor Utam requests your presence, sir," one of the stormtroopers said.

"On Concordia?" Jay asked, raising an eyebrow. They'd just got back home and she'd be damned if she was going to be dragged away  _again_.

But the trooper shook his helmeted head and said, "At Imperial Garrison Command north of Keldabe."

Vhetin sighed and turned to Jay, saying, "We might as well see what our esteemed governor wants with us. Probably nothing of interest; he's as  _mirshepar'la_  as a slab of duracrete."

Jay reluctantly nodded and followed the stormtroopers to a waiting speeder bus.

It was a fifteen-minute ride to the IGC, during which Jay caught her first glimpse of the area north of Keldabe. She'd only previously traveled south of the city, to the rural areas like Rame's farm, and this was a new experience for her.

The landscape couldn't be more different. Whereas the land south of Mandalore's capital city was little more than rural land studded here and there with farms, the land a few miles north seemed to be the center of Imperial power on the planet. There were hastily-built, slate-gray buildings everywhere she looked, and black banners displaying the Imperial Wheel flew above every doorway. Jay shuddered, slightly disgusted that the Empire could ruin such an otherwise beautiful landscape with their ugly, manufactured metal structures. As the speeder bus maneuvered around what looked like a local barracks, she caught her first look at Imperial Garrison Command.

It was easily the creepiest building she'd ever seen; it was a large, six-story building similar to the layout she'd seen in the schematics of the bombed-out IGC on Mon Calamari. But seeming to blend into the black and slate-gray durasteel of the Imperial building were...  _bones_. Huge bones, some easily bigger than tree trunks, stretched protectively around the building, like the arms of a sheltering mother Krayt Dragon. A huge tusked skull that was easily twice as large as the  _Oyu'baat_  cantina hung over the front entranceway like a trophy, supported by meter-thick pillars.

"What is  _that_?" Jay murmured to Vhetin, her lip curling in disgust.

Vhetin glanced at the IGC and chuckled. "Oh yeah. That's the IGC. The Imperials built the building into an old Mythosaur carcass. Skeleton City is what some of the  _vode_  back in Keldabe call it."

"Why would the Empire build their command inside a  _skeleton_?"

He chuckled again and murmured in a voice low enough that the stormtroopers couldn't hear, "It's a funny story actually. Back toward the end of the Clone Wars, the Empire came to Mandalore, looking for the perfect spot to set up their base camp. They asked what the skeleton was and some  _mir'shebs_  at the  _Oyu'baat_  told them that it was a sacred Mandalorian temple, where we offered up sacrifices to our gods."

"You don't have gods," Jay said. "At least not any that I've heard of."

"Yeah," Vhetin murmured, "but the Empire didn't know that. They got it in their head to use this 'temple' as their base camp, since it obviously held so much religious significance to us. You know, they'd show their superiority by desecrating our center of religious worship and put us in our place as it were. So we sold it to them."

Jay almost burst out laughing. "You  _what_?"

"Yeah," he chuckled. "Shysa made a pretty profit out of it, and just in time too. Apparently he was thinking of demolishing it; it wasn't useful as anything but a waste of space."

Jay was still laughing as they stepped out into the snow and headed toward the IGC. Jay looked up at the huge tusked skull and grinned as they passed inside.

Once within, they were subjected to the usual routine; they had to remove all their weapons and be triple-checked for hidden explosive devices. The Imperials were obviously taking no chances with so many well-armed Mandos on the planet.

After fifteen minutes, they were finally allowed into Governor Utam's office: a large, half-circle-shaped room with a long transparisteel window facing the Keldabe to the south. Even from this distance, Jay could pick out the colossal shape of MandalMotors tower, easily the tallest building in the entire city.

Utam himself was a portly, balding man of fifty with a seemingly permanent scowl frozen on his pudgy face. He was currently scribbling something onto a sheet of flimsi, focused intently on his work.

Jay had never met the man personally, but as he was the Imperial Overseer of Mandalore, he had made it a habit of sticking his nose into any business he could find. Vhetin was almost constantly being summoned to his presence, and Jay got the feeling that there was an animosity running between the two that was deeper than just Independent Mandalorian versus Bureaucratic Imperial.

"You called for us, sir?" Vhetin said, placing just enough emphasis on the word 'sir' to make it sound insincere.

Utam looked up at them blankly for a moment, then he clapped his hands and said, "Ah yes. I've been meaning to speak with you since you arrived in-system, but I was unfortunately stationed away from the base on Concordia."

"Otherwise you would have hijacked us from our own ships and dragged us to your office just to accuse us of crimes we never committed?" Vhetin asked, his voice utterly neutral.

Jay lips twitched slightly as she held back a grin; he obviously hadn't forgotten his last visit with Utam, when  _Void_  had been boarded by armed stormtroopers who had 'requested' his presence at gunpoint.

Utam didn't respond to the dig, rather smiling and stepping toward them. Jay unconsciously stood at attention, straightening her posture and hooking her hands behind her back.

"You misunderstand," Utam said. "I did not call you here to accuse you of anything. Rather, I wished to speak with you to offer my congratulations on a job well done on Mon Calamari, as well as to tell you how glad I am that you are finally seeing reason."

"Couldn't you have just sent a card?" Vhetin asked, his gaze staring carefully ahead. He was standing at attention as well, like a soldier in an inspection line.

"I am serious," Utam said. "If one more Imperial outpost came under attack by a black-armored Mandalorian, whether it was you or not, the results would have been... extreme."

Utam turned to Jay now, looking her up and down before saying, "As for you, my dear, I don't believe we've had the pleasure. You are?"

"Jaimie Moqena, sir." Jay reluctantly offered her hand as she gave Utam her fake name and said, "I'm Vhetin's new partner."

"Oh, of course. The bounty hunter from Nar Shadda," Utam shook her hand, smiling and nodding. He looked at her posture, that straight-backed stance that could only be a product of Imperial training, and said, "Did you serve in the military?"

"The Navy," Jay said truthfully. The Navy was one of the only branches of the Imperial military that accepted women; Jay knew that firsthand. It wasn't that uncommon for a woman to have served as a pilot, and Jay was banking on that to cover up the fact that Jaimie Moqena and Jayshiea Kolta were both pilots.

"Ah," Utam said. "And now you're a bounty hunter. May I ask what happened?"

"I was..." Jay hesitated, then said, "I was dishonorably discharged."

"Ah," Utam said again as he turned away. "I'm sorry."

"I'm not," Jay admitted. "It was the best thing that ever happened to me."

She noticed Vhetin turn his helmet ever-so-slightly towards her. Then he turned his gaze back to the window directly in front of him.

Utam sighed as he settled himself behind his desk again and said, "Well, I'm glad you two are proving to be allies to the Empire instead of nuisances. And if there is ever an opening for a full time job-"

"Give it to someone else," Vhetin interrupted. "I'm working freelance for as long as I can."

"Me too," Jay said, nodding in agreement.

The Governor shrugged and motioned them away. "As you wish. You may leave."

Vhetin bowed his head slightly in mock-respect and turned on his heel to leave. Jay followed him step-for-step, casting a glance over her shoulder and letting out a breath as the door to the Governor's office slid shut behind them.

"Well," she said, "Jaing's cover ID held. Thank the Force for that."

"Mm-hmm," Vhetin grunted.

She turned back to him and cocked her head slightly as they headed back for the speeder bus. "You know," she said as she retrieved their weapons once more, "you said back on Mon Cal that you would tell me why you hate Imperials so much."

"Did I?" he asked. "I don't remember-"

"Don't give me that," she interrupted. "I know you remember. Spill it."

He chuckled slightly and shrugged as he hooked his jetpack over his shoulders. "I don't see why not."

He paused, thinking for a moment before saying, "About four years ago I applied for a job with the Empire, thinking that I should part company with less-than-law-abiding figures like Sekha and Prince Xizor. I was turned away because I was too young; I was only maybe fifteen at the time."

Jay tried to picture Vhetin as a scruffy-looking teenager and found that it was impossible. He probably would have looked exactly the same in his armor anyway.

"What happened?"

"A certain Sith Lord took an interest in my swordsmanship skills," Vhetin said darkly. "He fed me some  _osik_  about a bounty on Kashyyyk. I got there, snooped around for a bit, and found out that the whole thing was a lie."

"What was Vader trying to do?" Jay asked. "Get you out of the way?"

"He drew me into a trap," Vhetin replied. "He attacked me."

"Wow," Jay said. "And you're still here."

Vhetin nodded as he said, "Yeah. After a pretty lengthy duel, he Force-choked me unconscious and basically kidnapped me. I woke up two days later in a bacta tank onboard some kind of secret Star Destroyer of Vader's."

"Is this where you became a supersoldier?"

He shook his head, laughed, and said, "For the last time, Jay, I am not - repeat  _not_  - a supersoldier. I don't know who told you that, but if I ever find them..."

"Would you tell me if you were?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No," he replied point-blank. "But I'm telling the truth."

"Yeah," she said, grinning as they headed down a side hall. "Whatever."

"Anyway," he said, "When Vader briefed me, he said that he was offering me a place on a special black-ops strike team for the Empire called the Imperial Correctional Force or ICF. It paid well and I knew that Vader would kill me if I refused, so... I took up his offer."

"So what happened?"

"At first everything was fine, more or less. The other nine strike team members were sadistic  _aruetiise_  who reveled in pain and destruction. I usually only worked with one of them: another bounty hunter named Boba Fett."

Jay nodded. She'd heard this before, while they'd been hunting in Anchorhead. That, and she'd secretly stolen an old journal of Vhetin's in an attempt to find out more about his past. She was still looking through it, determined to return it before her partner knew it was missing.

"How did you come to hate the Imperials?" she asked.

"Well... at first all we did was hunt down corrupt Senators and fugitives. Lethal action was necessary sometimes, but it was pretty much just a step up from normal bounty hunting. And then..."

He sighed and shook his head. "Then we started hunting renegade Jedi. And I was ordered to shoot a Padawan girl who was only a few years younger than I was."

"That's horrible," Jay said.  _Horrible, but_   _not_   _surprising._

"Two weeks later, I turned in my resignation," Vhetin said. "I didn't want anything more to do with the ICF. But instead of accepting my resignation, the Empire claimed that I was deserting and placed a bounty on my head."

"And?"

"And my own partner, Fett, tried to shoot me in the back while I tried to escape from the ICF base on Coruscant. After that, I swore that I would have nothing more to do with the Empire."

"Hm," Jay said, frowning thoughtfully. Eventually she shrugged and said, "Well, if there's any better reason to hate the Empire as much as I do, I can't think of one."

Vhetin said nothing, just held the door open for her and followed her into the speeder. He didn't say a word the entire ride back to Keldabe.

They parted ways at the  _Oyu'baat_ , Jay heading inside to return to her rented room there, Vhetin disappearing into the city to head back to wherever it was he lived.

She sat down at the bar with a sigh, running a hand through her messy hair. Now that she was finally alone, finally relaxed, she felt all the weight of the past few days come crashing down around her. Her muscles were so sore she felt as if she'd just been run over by a repulsor truck, and she was having trouble keeping her eyes open for much longer than a few seconds at a time.

Aramis looked up at her and narrowed his eyes thoughtfully.

"You look like you could use a drink," he observed.

Jay was hungry, sore, cold, and exhausted from her part in the events on Mon cal. What she needed was a good dinner, a comfortable bed with warm sheets, and eight hours of good, solid sleep. But somehow, Aramis' words summed up exactly how she felt.

She laughed wearily and shook her head. "I don't drink much. Not if I can help it."

"Glass of water, maybe?" the bartender offered. "It's free."

She nodded. "That fits into my budget. Go ahead and hit me."

Aramis chuckled and poured her a glass from the tap behind the bar. As he passed it across the bar to her, an armored Mandalorian slid into the stool next to her and said, "Water, huh? I guess it's better than being blasted on your ass by Aramis'  _ne'tra_   _gal._ Hey,  _Aram'ika_ , I'll have one too."

Jay looked over at the Mandalorian, who was dressed in reflective gray-red armor with several distinctly differently-colored armor plates. "I'm sorry," she said, "do I know you?"

He stared at her. "Really? You've only been gone three days and you've forgotten me? I'm hurt, I truly am."

He pulled his helmet off his head and Jay clapped a hand over her mouth.

"Oh, Venku," she said, blushing furiously in embarrassment. "I'm so sorry. I didn't-"

He waved a hand, dismissing her apology. "Don't worry about it," he said. "Everyone looks different when they're in full armor. Even  _Ba'buir_  Kal didn't recognize me when I changed my armor from the typical old green and red."

She nodded slowly, still blushing. She took a small sip of water and shook her hair out of her eyes. After a few minutes of exhausted silence, she said, "It's good to be home. I feel like I could sleep for a week."

He looked over at her. "So you're seeing Mandalore as home now?"

"Well, yeah," she said, surprised. "I mean, I've got nowhere else. This is home for me now. Is that a problem?"

He shook his head and took a swig of his own water. "Not at all. It's actually a good sign."

She narrowed her eyes playfully. "Of what?"

"That you're one step closer to be a ripe candidate for conversion. It almost seems like everyone who lives around Keldabe becomes Mandalorian at some point or another. I think it's our rugged charm."

She smiled. "No offense intended, but I'd rather not. I barely know the first thing about you guys. I don't think I'd be a good recruit just yet."

"Give it a few months," he replied. He took another long swig of water, then said, "So how was the Mon Calamari contract? Lots of swimming, sunbathing, general R-and-R? I'll look at the holopics if you've got 'em."

She laughed wearily and shook her head. "Don't even get me started. It'll take too long to tell the story."

"I'll have to hear it  _sometime_ ," he said, swirling the water around in his glass. "Come on, I'll buy you dinner and you can tell me about it. You've been cavorting around with the scum of the galaxy for the past few days; it'll be good to have someone civilized to talk to."

She narrowed her eyes again and half-smiled curiously. "Is that a pick-up line?"

He shrugged, putting on a nonchalant face that she almost believed was real. "It depends."

"Depends on what?"

"On whether it's working or not."

She smiled and downed the rest of her water in a single long swig as she stood from the bar. "That would be no," she said as she pushed in her barstool. "I'm too tired to want anything but a good... oh, say nineteen hours' sleep. How about a rain check?"

He nodded and grinned back. "I'll hold you to it."

"I won't forget."

She thanked Aramis and headed up to her rented room. She quietly stepped down the hall to her room, careful not to wake any of the tapcaf's other semi-permanent residents. She shut the door behind her, locked it, and drew the shades over the window.

Venku was right; it was odd that she was seeing Mandalore as her home so soon after her escape from prison. It usually took her longer to grow accustomed to such change.

 _Then_   _again,_ she thought as she undressed,  _as_   _homes_   _go, this_   _one_   _isn't_   _that_   _bad_.

Then she collapsed onto the bed, asleep before her head hit the pillow.


	17. Uruc's Fate

**Emperor**   **Palpatine**   **High-Security**   **Prison, Imperial**   **City**

The door lock buzzed, and Jolee Uruc looked up from her single good arm, which she had slowly been scraping at with a sharpened chunk of duracrete that had flaked off the wall some hours earlier. She wiped the blood away with steady metallic fingers and tossed the chip away.

The stormtrooper guard inched through the door, stun rifle raised, and said, "Prisoner three-eight-twelve, your presence is demanded at a special sentence revision hearing."

Uruc raised an eyebrow and settled back against the wall, setting her feet up on the edge of her cot and putting her hands behind her head. "I don't think I'm quite in the  _mood_  for another hearing. I've only been in this pussbucket of a prison for two days now and I'm already bored out of my skull."

"You will place your hands behind your head and allow yourself to be fitted with restraints. Refusal will result in disciplinary action."

She sighed and inspected the metallic 'fingernails' of the simple prosthetic they had outfitted her with upon her arrival to the prison. It was a basic piece of equipment - it didn't even have a motor capable of laying a stormtrooper flat on his back - but it served well enough to provide her with basic motor functions. It was a luxury, yes, but it was a luxury that she thought she rather deserved.

"So," she said almost conversationally, "do you come up with these clever little sayings by yourself, or do your superiors make you memorize them out of a book?"

The trooper stepped closer, turning on his stun gun. "Get up."

She looked him square in the faceplate and replied, "No."

"Get  _up_."

"Go to  _hell_."

He stuck the barrel of the rifle in her face and shouted, "Get your ass  _up_!"

Instantly she grabbed the gun barrel and wrenched it out of the trooper's hand, breaking his wrist in the process. With a practiced move, she swung it around and pulled the trigger, hitting the trooper in the chest. He was blasted back against the wall by the force of the concussive blast, and he slumped with a quiet gurgle.

She blew smoke from the barrel with a smile and crouched over him, leaning close and whispering, "You didn't say  _please_. You should be more polite, especially when in the presence of a lady."

The she grabbed the code key from his belt and headed for the door. She ran the chip past the security scanner inside her cell and it opened with another loud buzz. She cast one last glance around the room, making sure there was nothing she would need later, then stepped through the door-

-and ran right into a solid wall.

At least that's what it felt like. As she staggered back with a surprised cry, a loud, rasping breath filled the room. It was a sound known galaxy-wide, a sound that struck fear into the hearts of every man, woman, child, and otherwise that knew what was good for them.

Uruc stared with wide eyes at the massive black-armored form of Darth Vader as the Dark Lord stepped through the door. He slowly surveyed the tiny cell, his hands on his armored hips, his gaze lingering on the unconscious trooper for a moment before turning to Uruc.

She suddenly felt like a womp rat beneath the scrutiny of a hawkbat; for once in her life feeling as if  _she_  were the prey, and he the predator. She cowered, trembling and scrambling back toward her cot.

"Jolee Uruc," Vader rumbled, clenching his gloved hands into fists. "You are charged with over thirty counts of treason, twenty-two counts of murder, fifteen counts of illegal weapons smuggling, and fourteen counts of premeditated acts of malicious intent against the Empire."

With another mechanical wheeze, he continued, "Your judgment has been postponed for far too long."

She squeezed her eyes shut, thinking,  _this_   _can't_   _be_   _happening, this_   _can't_   _be_   _happening, this_   _can't-_

"It is unfortunate that it now must be postponed even longer."

Her eyes snapped open and she slowly turned back to the towering form of the Sith Lord. She blinked and stammered, "W-what?"

"As you are well aware," Vader boomed, "the Empire is under siege from a myriad of terrorists and warmongers wishing to uproot our control from its very foundations. We have been waging a silent war against these insurrectionists almost since the Empire's inception, and it is only a matter of time before these petty, squabbling freedom fighters unite into a more serious threat."

He slowly leaned forward and said, "You will now help us to stop them. You will be allowed severely restricted privileges - a shadow of your former freedom, I am sure - and will work with the Office of Imperial Intelligence to hunt down and eliminate these rebels. As a former terrorist yourself, you have the ideal contacts and experience in this field. You can think as they do, speak as they do, and lure them into traps they will never see coming. You will be our weapon against those who wish to bring harm to the Emperor and his ways."

Uruc's head spun; she couldn't believe it!  _That_  was why I.I had put a bounty on her head in the first pace; to reel her in so they could use her as a weapon against others like her! It was an ingenious plan, one so subtle and dangerous that only Imperial Intelligence could have thought it up.

Still, she glanced at Vader and narrowed her eyes, saying, "And... if I refuse?"

Suddenly, it became very difficult to breathe. A low rumble echoed through the room, and invisible hands began to squeeze at Uruc's throat. She sputtered and tried to grasp at her attacker, but her hands met nothing but empty air. She gasped and retched, but no air would penetrate her lungs.

"You would prefer the alternative?" Vader said.

"No-no!" she sputtered, coughing.

Vader released his invisible grip on her throat, satisfied with her response, and motioned for her to follow him through the door.

"Then follow," he boomed. "We have much to do."

~~~~~~~~

_To be continued in Star Wars: White Snow: Elimination_


	18. Next Time...

Next Time…

  
A remote smuggling outpost on the planet Telos is destroyed, with no survivors. The only signs of the culprit are strange, reptilian tracks and the bodies of massacred Mandalorians — the attacker’s victims. Weeks pass with more and more outposts falling to the hands of this mysterious attacker. This being must pay for these crimes, but first he must be found.

Prince Xizor, grand master of the mighty Black Sun crime syndicate, now turns to Cin Vhetin and his partner, Jay, to hunt down this bloodthirsty attacker. Vhetin quickly accepts the contract, eager to seek vengeance for his fallen brethren.

But as the hunters begin their investigation, they realize that they are not alone on this hunt. Another bounty hunter is hot on the target's trail, outwitting the competition time and again. It doesn't take long to discover their mysterious competitor's identity.

And what hope to Vhetin and Jay have to bring their target in when Boba Fett is also on the job?

~~~~~~~~

_Featuring guest appearances by Corey Black and Tal Tracyn, courtesy of Darth A-den and Burningdreams76, respectively, on Deviantart. com_


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